


CLUE: Carmilla Edition

by Heylittleyahtzee (HeyYahtzee)



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2018-12-30 05:43:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 25,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12102024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeyYahtzee/pseuds/Heylittleyahtzee
Summary: In the small town of Bellevue, a quiet gathering of persons convenes at the old house on the edge of town. All of them have history there. All of them have a story. And all of them could die tonight (though none of them do). Based on the movie CLUE and similar shenanigans. Written for the Carmilla Big Bang 2017!





	1. Here There Be

**Author's Note:**

> If you aren't sure what to leave in a comment, copy paste your favorite one liner!

Lightning cracks across the sky, revealing the dark mansion on the hill as well as any photographer with years of experience taking dramatic headshots of overrated actors. In the flickering, natural strobe effect, the mansion stands like an imposing, mountainous peak that reigns over the sleepy town beneath it. Deep green paint in black mold covers it from foundation (cracked) to shingle (crooked). The windows are overgrown with vines, the garden overgrown with broken furniture, and the driveway overgrown with rusted, shipwrecked cars.

A hooded figure struggles up the front steps. They’re dragging a large sack behind them, grunting and swearing as it hits every concrete ledge on the way up. Both the figure and the sack are drenched through from the rain, though for now only one of them is bothered by it.

Finally reaching the level of the porch, the hooded figure presses their ear to the door. There is a strange sound coming from within, a harmonious and yet dissident chanting that borders on yowling. They sigh. Not this again.

Elsewhere: In the hall leading from the conservatory to the study to be specific: a short, stocky person with bright red hair is moonwalking through the house. They are dressed in goulashes and a bright blue work jumper speckled with mud. Hanging from their ears are fluorescent green headphones. Their head moves wildly from side to side in time with a phantom beat, echoing from their ears like a soft, crooning, wild house party.

“YEAH I CAN MAKE YOUR HANDS CLAP,” the gardener sings loudly as they moonwalk into the study at the end of the hall.

Dusting the shelves in a frilled french maid outfit is a tall manchild with short cropped brown hair and fantastic arms. He swings his hips as he dances from one bookshelf to the next, a similar pair of headphones hanging from his ears.

“FIRST ONE UP WAS A PREACHER’S SON, LAST ONE DOWN WAS AN ENGLISHMAN,” the maid sings.

The two meet in the middle, each jumping back in surprise as they collide. After a moment of hesitation they groove back into it, yelling the lyrics even louder.

“I’M IN BED WITH HIS BOWTIE ON ALL DRESSED UP FOR A HIT AND RUN.

“EVERY NIGHT WHEN THE STARS COME OUT, AM I THE ONLY LIVING SOUL AROUND”

They’re still dancing and yelling in each other’s faces when the hooded figure steps into the room and crosses their arms. They’d only been trapped together in this house for a week and these two are already driving everyone up the wall. What a fucking headache.

“YAY MUSIC OKAY SHUT UP,” the hooded figure yells.

The impromptu dance partners trip over each other in surprise, ripping their headphones out of their ears and smoothing their clothes into as much innocence and grace they can muster.

The hooded figure sighs and pushes the hood off, shaking her long blonde hair out and fussing at the wet streaks in her bangs.

“I thought I told you two not to host wild cat screeching parties anymore,” she says. As the butler, it’s her job to keep everyone else in line. She just hadn’t expected to buy a purgatorial time share in the process.

“We were just finishing up our assignments,” the gardener says, “there wasn’t like, an actual plan.”

“Yeah, it was like, a total accident! I was just doing my own thing and then I bumped into Laf and they bumped into me, like, super not on purpose Betty!” the maid says.

“Fine, whatever, but I’m still sporting a headache for two,” the butler grumbles. Honestly if her reputation wasn’t at stake she would have never accepted such a strange smuggling job, and if she hadn’t accepted the job, she wouldn’t have ever ended up back in weird little Bellevue.

“You’re pregnant?!” the maid yelps.

“Kirsch! Christ! No! The final preparations will be done in a moment. Both of you, check in with Perry in the kitchen and see if she needs any help getting dinner ready.”

The butler rubs her temples as the two scurry bashfully off. At least it was almost done. Their employer had said it would only take a few minutes after the items were in place, and she’d finished that before she came in.

There’s a pinch behind her eyes. The butler gasps softly and blinks. The mental fog she’d been suffering for the past several weeks is gone, and her sight, which had been slowly dimming, returns. The pain ebbs away until it was only a dull reminder of the stupidity that had brought her to the house.

The butler shakes herself and glances around the study. All the shelves had been repaired, and the furniture reupholstered; in fact, each room had been returned as closely as possible to its original glory. Betty grins and shucks off her raincoat. Beneath she’s wearing her very best three piece suit and bowtie. She walks back into the hall, her shoes clicking on the polished marble floor.

The clock on the landing of the grand staircase strikes six.

The guests would be arriving any moment.

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

Somewhere on the long and winding road to the house on the hill, a bright green volkswagon bug sits like a beacon between a tree and a fence. The rain is still coming down hard, but that doesn’t deter the girl with her head underneath the hood of the car,

She’s petite, brunette, and wearing a strapless, green velvet dress with a pair of black flats. She’s also covered up to her elbows in grease. Of course today had to be the day that her car finally bit the dust. She was Laura Hollis after all, and in the Laura Hollis universe things always happened to the extreme. She was a rising star, or she was a fraud. Employed or destitute. Surrounded or alone.

And this time that means figuring out how to fix her car with nothing but a crappy, coffee stained manual.

She’s just about ready to slam the hood down and start walking back to town (damn the consequences) when a pair of headlights pull around the bend in the road. They’re approaching at an alarming speed, and in the moments before she can make out the black car behind them, Laura almost understands why people believe in flying saucers.

It’s a sleek, black Jaguar with silver accents and tinted windows, and it pulls up next to Laura with hardly a rumble. At first nothing happens, and then there’s a click and the passenger side window slides down to reveal the interior of the car.

Laura wipes the hair out of her face and squints through the rain.

The young woman in the driver’s seat has dark, wavy hair and a sharp, white smile. She leans over the passenger seat and tilts her aviators to get a good look under the hood of Laura’s bug.

“Looks like you overheated the engine, sweetheart,” she drawls.

Usually Laura would admonish that kind of language but she finds herself completely distracted by the sharp curve of the woman’s jaw line and the way her arm hangs over her steering wheel in her black leather jacket.

The woman raises an eyebrow at her, grin widening.

Laura blushes and forces herself to look back at the bug. God, her poor little car.

“I guess I took that last hill too fast, but I'm late and it’s so dark and I just wanted to get to the stupid dinner party.” She’s half mumbling to herself, but the woman in the car still catches every word.

“Dinner Party? Wouldn’t happen to be at the Silas Manor would it?”

Laura looks up in surprise, “Yeah, how did you… oh.”

The woman laughs, “Looks like we’re going to be dinner dates, Cupcake.”

The way she says it makes the hair on Laura’s arms stand on end.

“What makes you think we’re going to be the only people there?” she asks.

“Oh, we won’t. But the others are going to be boring,” the woman sighs, “Come on, hop in. Standing in the rain is just going to make us later than we already are.”

“But my car-”

“Will be fine until we can call a tow truck from the house. What? Are you going to lie and tell me you have service out here?”

Laura scowls, “I’m not sure I want a ride from someone with that attitude.”

“Well with my track record, I’m the last person passing your way all night. Plus, I’m not going to leave you stranded out here by yourself, even if you are a little prissy. Girl Code, or whatever.”

Laura considers it.

“Look, if it makes a difference, the seats are heated.”

“Fine,” Laura says. What could be the worst that happens, right?

When she’s finally buckled in, the woman holds her hand out.

“For the purposes of tonight’s charade you can call me Lady Black”

“I’m… Miss Green,” Laura says, shaking her hand.

“It’s a pleasure,” Lady Black says. She puts the car into drive and they speed away into the pouring night.

 

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

At the precise moment that Lady Black and Miss Green acquainted themselves, the Silas Manor kitchen suffered a small explosion. Not an explosion of the culinary nature, but rather an explosion of the human nature.

Specifically, a nature that looks startlingly like Shirley Temple and Pippi Longstockings grew up to be the same person and then joined every local PTA without ever having even the slightest contact with an actual human child.

(And yes, the human part is relevant)

For reference, the kitchen of Silas Manor is located near the back on the ground floor; adjacent to the servants quarters and the garden where the fresh herbs and poison bearing fruits were grown. The bloodcurdling scream emitted from the kitchen at precisely 5:54 PM reached the attic in no time at all. In fact, it reached the attic so well it traumatized the squirrel family living there and they packed their walnuts and left immediately.

And the exterminator said he’d tried everything!

Our two intrepid dancers from the study burst onto the scene expecting to find the walls covered in blood. Instead they found their beloved colleague with flour on her face and a collapsed souffle.

“Per!”

“Don’t! Don’t take another step!” the cook squeaks. The souffle quivers in distress.

“What happened to the weird pancake?” Kirsch whispers.

Quick as a bullet, the window behind the sink whips open and shut with a loud BANG.

“The wind,” the cook whines, “the wind and this house and this stupid mess that we’ve gotten ourselves into! Now dinner is ruined!”

The gardener scurries to her side, “No, Per! No one’s going to notice if there are only…. Six? Six courses?”

The cook shakes her head, “The Master said it had to be perfect! What if… oh, oh, oh, no!”

The cook leans heavily on the gardener and the gardener wraps their hands around her waist.

“It’ll be okay, Per. I’m not going to let that bastard do anything to any of us,” the gardener whispers in her ear. The cook smiles softly, tears brimming her eyes. Oh, how had they ever gotten themselves into this mess.  

“I can always, like, walk into the dining room and start flexing? That usually distracts people,” the maid offers. He does a few demonstrational flexes and raises his eyebrows at them hopefully.

“Oh, Kirsch you’re so sweet,” the cook sighs, “But it’s alright. This whole awful business has just got me stretched to my wits end!”

“Just remember, Per, after tonight it’s all going to be over.” the gardener says.

“Right. Yes. I’ll just…. Adjust the menu. The soup can be it’s own course separate from the salad instead of a side dish. It’s only a chowder but it will have to do.” The cook wipes her face on her apron and sniffs, composing herself back into the starched and pressed motherly figure they both know and love.

 

**DING**

 

**DONG**

 

“That must be the first guest,” the gardener says, fiddling with their headphones nervously.

“I suppose there’s no turning back now,” the cook murmurs.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

In the foyer, the butler throws open the door to reveal a woman wearing a sage colored dress and matching hat a la the directions of the invitation: _50’s Vintage Black Tie Required._

“Hi, I think I was invited to dinner?” the woman says.

“Yes, Miss Sage, you were! We’ll be starting the evening in the lounge,” the butler says with a smile (a mostly sarcastic one mostly to herself but there was a modicum of effort involved in playing her part and the boss wasn’t there to see it so really who cares).

“My name is actually Da-”

“Woah there, didn’t you read the invite? No real names. Strictly Prohibited,” the butler tsks as she whisks Mis Sage into the lounge. Miss Sage looks around apprehensively. _You probably aren’t going to get murdered,_ she reminds herself, _after all, whoever it is wants your money, and there’s no more money if you’re dead, right?_

“The maid will be in shortly with some champagne if you’d like to make yourself comfy,” the butler says, and disappears back the way they had come in.

Miss Sage takes a deep breath and shakes herself.

“You can do this,” she whispers to herself.

Just as she’s about to sit down the door swings open and the Maid comes barreling in with a tray of sloshing champagne glasses.

“Who’s ready for some pre-gaming am I right or am I right!” He practically shouts.

Miss Sage’s mouth drops clear to the floor, “KIRSCH?”

 

**DING**

**  
** **DONG**

 

“Ah, Professor Peach, right on time,” the butler says to the man in the peach colored suit jacket on the front porch.

“Am I? I can hardly tell in all this rain,” he says in a thick british accent.

“Well, you are. Clock says so. Come on into the lounge,” the butler says, rolling her eyes.

“Have we met before?”

“They hatched me out of my butler egg this morning, so I sincerely doubt it.”

Professor Peach blinks at her, “That’s an odd… metaphor.”

“Sometimes the common metaphor needs a little metamorphosis, dontcha think?” the butler grins.

“I suppose….”

They step into the lounge to find Miss Sage standing at the window with a glass of champagne resting against her throat.

The maid stands in the corner, staring at the ground as if maybe if he’s lucky it will swallow him up.

 “We have another guest,” the butler chirps brightly.

“Oh! Um, champagne?” the maid offers, picking up the tray and bringing it over.

 “Why yes, thank you… my good man,” Professor Peach says, looking him up and down curiously, then realizing his mistake, he quickly clears his throat and takes a glass, “That’s a very nice dress you have there. Is it original?”

 “I found it in the closet upstairs, so I’m gonna go with yeah, dude, definitely vintage. I was SO stoked you wouldn’t even believe,” the maid says, the light in his eyes returning a little.

 The butler slips out at some point but no one notices.

 “My name…. I suppose my alias, isn’t it? Is Professor Peach,” the professor tells them. He thinks of himself as somewhat of a social creature, and very kind, which includes a keenness for proper introductions and self-congratulatory charity work.

 “Miss Sage,” the woman at the window grumbles.

 “They just call me the maid,” the maid says.

 “Very professional of them,” Professor Peach says.

 Miss Sage eyes him wearily, “Give it a minute. The illusion fades pretty quickly.”

 Professor Peach hmm’d into his champagne and took a seat on the couch.

  _What the ever-loving fucked up bullshit have I just walked into,_ he thought to himself.

 

**DING**

**  
** **DONG**

 

The butler hardly has the door open before a woman in a long silver dress and matching handbag sweeps into the house.

“Well, isn’t this quaint,” she purrs, “I assume you already know who I am?”

The butler has to clear her throat a few times, “Madame Silver, among other household names.”

Madame Silver grins, “My, my, cultured and witty. Flattery will get you a seat at my table any day. Who might you be?”

“Just the butler, Ma’am,” the butler stammers.

“What, no name?” Madame Silver teases.

“Not tonight, Ma’am. The rules are quite clear.”

Madame Silver’s smile falters slightly. She steps closer.

“So you’re one of us?” she asks softly.

“The lounge is just through this door,” the butler replies.

Madame Silver purses her lips. Well, two could play at that game.

She steps into the lounge as directed and her eyes light up. Whoever had redecorated had really outdone themselves. The other guests seem suspiciously listless, but such is to be expected considering the circumstances.

“Hello, hello everyone. What a beautiful night, isn’t it?” Madame Silver says. The man in the terrifying pink and orange suit smiles at her.

“It certainly is something. I’ve never seen a storm like this,” he says, “I’m Professor Peach.”

“Madame Silver. And I’d have to agree. There’s something… almost magical about this storm.”

“Miss Sage and I were just conversing about the different kinds of lightning one might see in a storm like this!” the professor says.

“Really? Do tell me more,” Madame Silver says, settling onto the velvet couch beside him.

 

**DING**

**  
** **DONG**

 

The butler groans and straightens out her coat. How many more could there possibly be?

She steps up to the door and flung it open.

“Welcome to-”

“Oh my god.”

They stare at each other for a long moment. The woman in the lavender vest on the porch coughs awkwardly.

“Betty?” the woman asks.

“Mayor Lavender,” Betty murmurs, “I hadn’t… put it together.”

“Betty, what’s going on? I got a weird invite to some dinner party put on by… Sir Vordenburg?”

“Look, don’t ask any questions and keep your head down. I know it’s not your style but there is some freaky weird shit going on, okay?”

The Mayor blinks at her in astonishment, “Are you saying…”

“Yes.”

The mayor swallows and nods, “You know I can’t promise you anything, but I’ll keep an eye out.”

“Just… be careful. And you’ve never seen me before. Or anyone else.”

“Anyone else??”

“You’ll see.”

The butler opens the door to the lounge quietly. The assorted guests are sitting and standing about the room, the professor and madame engaged in a light conversation about weather patterns while the maid interjects sporadically to ask enthusiastic questions and drink champagne that isn’t his.

“Oh,” the mayor says.

“Yep,” the butler confirms.

 

**DING**

**  
** **DONG**

 

The butler runs back to the door and throws it open.

“Looks like we’re all running a bit late,” the man in the Indigo wool coat at the door teases.

“Mr.Indigo. Please come in,” the butler grins.

“Just so you know, I have an early morning flight back to New York and I’ll only be able to stay for part of the evening. Is there anyway we can get this business over with… quickly?”

“There is a schedule, Mr.Indigo.”

“Shit. Well. We’ll try our best, I guess,” he says.

The butler shows him into the lounge. He smirks.

“Well, this ought to be interesting.” He takes a seat in the available armchair. Miss Sage refuses to meet his eye, though Madame Silver gives him an approving nod across the coffee table.

“Champagne?” the maid asks.

“Oh, yes please. That’s practically a requirement,” Mr.Indigo laughs, “Considering the state of affairs I assume we’re all in?”

“Do you have something you want to share with the class, or are you just observant?” Madame Silver asks.

“Just observant. Have we met?”

“No idea.”

Mayor Lavender steps away from the bookshelves built into the far wall, “I think we’re supposed to keep our real identities to ourselves.”

Mr.Indigo shrugs and folds his hands across his lap. Madame Silver raises an eyebrow but turns instead to sip her champagne.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Peering out of the tinted window, Laura can just see the outline of the weird house on the hill. She shivers and hunkers down farther in the heated seats.

“Getting cold feet?” Lady Black asks.

“No, it just…. looks creepy….” Laura says. She doesn’t mention the ghost story associated with the house that she may or may not be intimately familiar with.

She feels like that’s the kind of information that falls under the invitation’s sub-clause A: _under no circumstances should you speak of yourself or details surrounding your day to day life, including any details related to our host or our destination._

“Well, old houses do trend towards a very specific aesthetic,” Lady Black grins.

At the top of the driveway they find a host of other cars already parked and growing cold. Everything and the wide open sky drip with the fat rain of a midsummer night's storm. Madame Black pulls the car up next to a vine streaked wall and puts it into park.

“Now or never, cupcake,” she drawls.

 

**DING**

 

**DONG**

 

A woman with blonde hair in a deep black suit opens the door, her smile wide and unforgiving.

“Oh, I wasn’t aware you two knew each other,” she says.

“Oh no, we don’t, I just-”

“Saved her from some car trouble,” Lady Black explains, brushing past the butler into the house. She raises an eyebrow at the marble floor and high, crystal chandelier.

“We’re just about to start dinner,” the butler says.

“Perfect, I’m starving,” Lady Black sighs.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~

 

After the arrival of Miss Green and Lady Black, the guests are led to the dining room and seated around a large walnut table stacked high with plates and silverware and not even a glimpse of food.

“This is a little… extreme… right?” Miss Sage asks.

“It’s traditional,” Madame Silver says, “and very attractive! Look at these adorable plates!”

“Is our host going to join us?” Mr.Indigo asks, “As I said before, I’d like to get this taken care of sooner rather than later.”

The Butler purses her lips, “He’ll be with us soon. There was a slight… complication.”

Miss Green can’t stop looking at all the patterns and fabrics making up each room. It is so much more than modern aesthetics ever require. She picks up the shortest fork next to her plate and turns it back and forth. There are swirling patterns carved into the silver up the handle, and it looks old, like, centuries old.

Lady Black takes the seat next to her, shooing Professor Peach into the seat at the end. She’d been hovering just out of the corner of Miss Green’s eye since they came in and met the others. There’s something vaguely uncomfortable in the air, and Miss Green takes her time in looking discreetly at the other members of the dinner party. For the most part she doesn’t recognize them, but she’s positive she’d seen the maid before, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out who “Mayor Lavender” is, even if she hadn’t been back to Bellevue since her brief recon mission two years ago.

The others for their credit seem to also be sending each other surreptitious glances over the wine glasses and silver candlesticks. It makes Laura feel a little bit better about her predicament.

The first course is a thick soup made from what seems to be chicken and assorted vegetables. It’s carried into the room in a giant silver pot by a very frazzled looking ginger cook followed by a second ginger in a shimmering gold vest.

Slowly but surely, the guests begin picking up their spoons and pushing the veggies around in their broth. No one is quite comfortable, or quite sure what they are all doing in this house on such a night.

“God, I just can’t let this depressing nothing go on any longer. Personally, I’m a bit of a talker, and look at how strange an evening we’ve all been coerced into attending!”

The butler opens her mouth to object but Madame Silver holds up a hand, “Don’t deny what we all already know. If anyone is here free of duress speak now or forever hold your peace, darlings.”

“Why can’t we all just follow the rules?” Miss Sage asks, her spoon tapping against the table irritably, “This isn’t a game, and I for one want to survive whatever craziness is going on so I can go back to my nice normal life tomorrow.”

“You know, I was wondering why some dude I’d never heard of would pick this house to have this little meeting in, considering…” Mr.Indigo wiggles his eyebrows with a sly smile.

“I’m not sure we’re supposed to talk about that either. The invitation specifically said-” the professor begins.

“I know what it said. But here we are without a host, without conversation. Who’s going to rat us out?” Mr.Indigo asks, leaning back in his chair.

Laura puts her spoon down and takes a deep breath, “What’s there to talk about? It’s an old house on a weird dead end lane twenty miles from the nearest street with sidewalks. If I was planning a secret meeting between a bunch of strangers in the creepiest way possible this is exactly the kind of place I would pick.”

“Rambling much?” Madame Silver laughs.

“Well, it’s true!”

“Sounds like someone doesn’t want us to talk about it. So how about you fill those who don’t know in on the story, Miss Green? You clearly know what you’re talking about,” Mr.Indigo presses.

“No! I don’t know anything, I’m just… saying that aesthetically-”

“Is this supposed to be convincing?” Lady Black murmurs.

“There’s no ghost!” the butler insists loudly. Everyone stops and looks at her.

“Well, that doesn’t sound suspicious,” Mr.Indigo laughs, “Aren’t you supposed to be the one enforcing the rules here?”

Madame Silver chuckles low in her throat, “Oh, that old folktale has no basis. No one has lived in this house for nearly a century. Look it up!” 

“Ah, but you also know about the story!” Professor Peach says excitedly. 

“I also know that several of us in this room are acquainted with each other and I’m inclined to be a bit curious what the connection between all of us-”

“That will be quite enough, Fraulein.”

In the doorway looms an imposing man who stands as if he is much taller than he actually is. He wears a wrinkled grey suit that drips ominously, with a single white carnation in the breast pocket. He also carries a slightly bent cane. There is a small gash on his forehead coated with congealed blood. His smile is amicable.

“All will be explained momentarily. Please enjoy the dinner our wondrous cook prepared, and after we will retire to the study to speak about business. No need to rush. We have all night,” he says.

“And who are you supposed to be?” Mr.Indigo asks.

“Don’t,” Miss Sage hisses, “It’s _him.”_

“Oh, shit sticks,” Laura whispers. Him. That was _him._

“Sir Vordenburg,” the butler says quietly, pulling his chair out.

The room falls into a deep, easily penetrable silence.

Laura tries. She really does. She stares at her soup, wheeling her spoon around in circles. The anger she’d been bottling up for all those months is creeping up her spine.

“Why are you doing this?” she asks.

“I’m sure I don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about,” Vordenburg says, slurping his soup out of his spoon.

“How is that even possible? It was on the invitation.” Laura raises her hands in sarcastic air quotes, “Lack of attendance will cause your current payments to double.”

“Mine said triple,” Mr.Indigo mutters.

“So then it’s settled. Each of us have been paying a ransom to you for our dearest secrets,” Madame Silver grins.

Everyone starts talking at once, the room filling with an angry and scoffing rumble.

“You’ll never get away with this,” Mayor Lavender shouts.

“Answer the question, asshole!” Miss Sage growls.

“What I want to know is how long were you planning on keeping up this little charade!” Professor Peach enquires rather demurely.

“ENOUGH,” Vordenburg roars.

There is a sudden crash from the hallway. The noise cuts out. Everyone stares at the door in surprise. After a moment it creaks open and the gardener sticks their head in.

“Sorry, uh, there was a slight spill in the hallway,” they say.

“No matter. We’re clearly not going to finish the meal thanks to these heathenistic youths,” Vordenburg snarls. He leaps from his chair and out the door. The shock of seeing a frail old man with a cane pull a Willy Wonka causes everyone to stay in their seats.

“What are we just going to sit here?” Laura splutters after a moment. Everyone scrambles out of their chair, heels, glitter, tie pins and all, and dash after Vordenburg.

They find him in the lounge, surrounded by black boxes with blood red ribbons ranging from the size of a jewelry box to a small chest. The lounge itself is dripping with red. Red curtains, red carpets, red cherry book cases. Even the diamonds on the chandelier are red, casting an eerie pink glow around the room like an evil disco ball full of blood.

“Each of these boxes has one of your aliases written on the tag,” Vordenburg says, “and they come with a challenge. Someone in this room has taken something that I want. Whoever can find it, through whatever means necessary, will be rewarded with the erasure of their moral debt.”

Laura finds her box on the large wooden desk, next to that of Professor Peach. It’s perhaps four feet long and only about a foot wide. She picks it up and shakes it first, then pulls the ribbon and the lid off only to nearly drop the box in shock. Inside is a glittering sword with a bejeweled hilt and a series of strange inscriptions on the blade.

Beside her, Professor Peach drops what looks like an ancient wooden spear onto the grey plush carpet. At the fireplace, Lady Black is holding a small bottle of clear liquid with a cross across the top, Miss Sage a small porous stone with rainbow cracks, and Madame Silver a small dagger with a crow carved into the handle. Mayor Lavender sinks into the couch, a small obsidian scythe in her hands. Mr.Indigo gingerly places a whip onto the bookshelf and avoids looking at it. Three boxes were unaccounted for.

“You want us… to kill each other?” Miss Sage asks incredulously.

Laura drops the sword on the desk with a clang and jumps back. She’s supposed to _hurt people_ with that?!

“Kill, maim, threaten, whatever you’d like to do in order to return my property to me and gain your freedom,” Vordenburg chuckles.

“What about the extra boxes,” Mayor Lavender asks warily, eyeing the others in the room.

“Oh yes, I forgot. You are not the only ones who will be involved in this little game. If my staff could please step into the room,” Vordenburg calls out the door.

One by one the maid, butler, cook, and gardener enter the room.

“This wasn’t part of the deal,” the butler snaps.

“Oh, but it is part of the process, my dear,” Vordenburg laughs, hand on his hip.

The maid receives a blood red book, the gardener a winged staff twined in snakes, the cook a gold-tipped bow with a quiver of arrows, and the butler a ball of shimmering thread.

“Well pardon me, but I’m not interested in this kind of barbaric game,” Madame Silver sneers, throwing the dagger down on the coffee table.

“What is it you’re looking for?” Mr.Indigo asks.

“Really? You’re actually considering this?” Laura snaps. Mr.Indigo shrugs.

“The thing I’m looking for is a locket of pure gold with a ruby set into the face. First one to bring it to me is free to leave this place, and our agreement…. the price of my silence, paid in full,” Vordenburg says, “Find the locket and all of this will be over.”

“And you think one of us has it?” Lady Black asks. It’s the first time Laura has heard her speak since dinner started, and the familiar voice throws her off.

“I _know_ one of you has it,” Vordenburg says, “In fact, I know that one of you _stole it from me.”_

And just like that the lights cut out.


	2. And Then There Were

There’s a shriek, a whistling sound, and a crack. 

In the lightning stained darkness, Laura dives behind the desk and begins scrabbling around for the sword. At the very least she has to protect herself, right? 

Just as suddenly as the lights went off, they snap back on. Laura freezes. In front of her the professor is curled into a very tight ball. In fact, it’s amazing she didn’t fall right on top of him.

The gardener and the cook hadn’t been so lucky.

But also it looks moderately intentional…

The most surprising thing (but perhaps the most obvious) is the sight of Sir Vordenburg’s body splayed out on the carpet next to the coffee table, eyes wide and lifeless, the wound on his head never to see the days in which it was a giant black and purple scab. The only two people still standing are Lady Black and Madame Silver. They nod to each other approvingly. 

“What…. What HAPPENED?” the cook sobs.

“Clearly someone killed him,” Mr.Indigo says, “Which means we’re all free to go.”

“Um,” the butler says.

“Well I suppose that take cares of that,” Lady Black says.

“Well,” the butler says.

“Yeah, I’m out,” Miss Sage agrees. People start scrambling towards the door.

“WAIT,” Laura yells, “We can’t just leave him here! One of us killed him! You’re all just going to let that go?”

“Miss Green is right,” Mayor Lavender says, picking herself up off the floor, “If we just leave him here it won’t be hard to trace all this back to us. Besides, even if he was blackmailing all of us, we can’t just let a murderer go free.”

“You’re the mayor you have to say that,” Kirsch whimpers from where he’s pressed against the wall.

The mayor folds her arms over her chest, prepared to defend herself, but no one even seems phased or even bothered by the revelation. 

It’s the gardener who scootches forward on all fours and checks for a pulse and then turns the body over to check for a wound.

“Uh, guys, I don’t know about you but I don’t see any kind of injury.”

Everyone leans over like a herd of giraffes to get a better look.

“Well, I heard a whistling sound if that helps,” the professor says.

“It was the dagger!” Miss Sage says, “Look.”

Near where Madame Silver had been standing, the crow dagger is sticking out of the wall. She puts her hand to her chest and staggers back.

“Oh dear,” she says quietly. This was not what she had in mind at all when she accepted the invitation. Perhaps she should have just paid the double ransom and left it at that.

”Aren’t you the one that got the dagger in the first place?” Mr.Indigo asks.

“Yes but I set it down on the table,” Madame Silver says.

“Then the only person who was in reach of it was….” All eyes turn toward Mayor Lavender.

“Don’t look at me! I didn’t pick it up!”

“But if it wasn’t you then….” Everyone slowly looks at Vordenburg, half slumped over the coffee table.

“That… doesn’t make any sense.”

“Maybe the effort killed him?” the maid suggests, “I mean he was totally old and totally wrinkly.”

“That’s not how that works,” Mr.Indigo says, patting the maid on the shoulder. 

“What we need is a way to collect fingerprints from that dagger,” Laura speaks up.

“And where would we get the resources for that kind of investigation?” Madame Silver snaps, still sore about the dagger so close to her face.

“What we need are the police,” Mayor Lavender, “They’ll be able to sort all of this out in an orderly manner.”

“No way! Vordenburg was blackmailing everyone in this room! You think we want the police showing up here?” Mr.Indigo says.

“Are you sure you want to admit to whatever crime you committed right here in front of all of us?” Lady Black asks.

“Why would you immediately assume I was being blackmailed for a crime? Unless…” Mr.Indigo raises an eyebrow at her.

“You want to know what I did? Fine. I don’t expect any of you to go running to the authorities. I smuggle rare books for a living. The pay’s good and it comes with free in-flight reading. Vordenburg figured out some of my contacts and threatened to reveal them to certain… people… if I didn’t do what he asked,” Lady black explains.

Laura’s mouth dropped open, “You’re a smuggler? Is that how you paid for that car?”

“If I’m a smuggler do I pay for anything?”

The maid’s eyes go wide, “Woah, that sounds like history”

“Lover’s spat,” Madame Silver whispers over her shoulder.

“Excuse me?” Laura squeaks, wheeling around to look a them.

“That did sound kind of… weird,” Miss Sage says.

Laura looks at Lady Black for some much needed back up.

“Eh, you’re cute and I’ve been called worse.”

Laura groans, “I so do not belong here.”

“What? Think you’re better than us? What’d you do?” Lady Black asks, stalking towards her.

“Nothing.”

“You’re lying.”

“Well… what did everyone else do? What’d the mayor do? Are we going to talk about any of that?”

Those around the room who had been leaning in like the gossip mongers they are quickly look anywhere else.

“So we aren’t going to call the police, we aren’t going to figure out why Vordenburg thought one of us had a weird locket, and we aren’t going to figure out this whole blackmail situation?” Laura asks, “We’re just going to run away and leave a dead body on the floor like that’s a totally normal thing to do.”

“I’m in,” Mr.Indigo says

“Like Miss Green said, I don’t belong here either, “ Miss Sage, “Not if the room is filled with international thieves and actual real life murders.” 

“I think we can agree that a large number of us were probably just trying to do what was best, right?” the gardener speaks up.

“Seconded!” Professor Peach says popping up from behind the desk. 

“Then what are we waiting for?” Madame Silver says, “If anyone asks we came to dinner and as far as we knew he was alive when we left!”

Everyone bolts for the door simultaneously. They clatter and clack out into the foyer ( “marble floors are a bitch” someone in heels mutters) like a pack of very uncoordinated lemmings. The only person with any composure at all is Madame Silver, on account of she never plans on opening a door if there’s someone who can open it for her. 

Laura, the maid, the butler, the cook, and the gardener stand in the doorway of the study and watch the stampede.

“Oh boy,” the butler says.

Mr.Indigo and Miss Sage hit the door at the same time. The each take one handle and YANK. The door creaks, but otherwise stays in place. Miss Sage and Mr.Indigo look at each other, at the lock, and at each other again. 

“Uh, pardon, I’ll just-” the professor reaches forward and unlocks the door.

Miss Sage and Mr.Indigo rattle the doors again, but they still hold to their frame.

“Um,” the professor says.

“It’s not going to work,” the butler says.

“You can’t seriously tell me we’re going to be thwarted by a door,” Madame Silver groans.

“A magic door,” the butler says.

Very slowly, everyone turns to look at her. She shrugs and gestures at the house.

“You really think a house like this is going to be normal?”

“Are you suggesting that... the stories are true?” Madame Silver giggles. The butler sighs for ten full seconds and then nods.

There’s a heavy thud as the maid collapses onto the floor in a dead faint. 

“I’m sorry,” Mr.Indigo says, waving his arms around in confusion, “What does any of that- I mean- How? How does that have anything to do with us and Sir Vordenburg blackmailing us? He’s obviously not a ghost. The gardener touched his body, and we all saw him eat the soup.”

The butler nods in a forlorn “why me” sort of way, “You’re right. Vordenburg had nothing to do with any of this. Vordenburg was just a creepy old guy blackmailing all of you because he liked the rush of adrenaline it gave him. He’s not even the one who invited you all here. She was.”

And as they all watch, the butler points to one of the ancient portraits on the wall. It shows a woman, wrinkled and greying, wearing a black gown and holding a crow on her outstretched hand. Laura feels a shiver go down her spine. She’d looked into those yes once before and it had not turned out well. 

“I’m sorry, you’re saying that a ghost- specifically the ghost of the founder of Silas- invited all of us here? Yeah, okay, well, assuming we live in a world where that actually makes sense, why?” Miss Sage asks, crossing her arms.

“For exactly the reason Madame Morgan said before, y’know when she was possessing Vordenburg’s body. She thinks one of you has her precious locket, and she’s not letting any of us go until she finds it,” the butler explains.

“She was possessing his body?” Laura asks in horror.

“Why do you think he looked so messed up? She killed him last Tuesday when he refused to help her find it, then invited all of you here. You aren’t the only people he was blackmailing, after all, you’re just the ones she suspected.”

Everyone looks warily at each other.

“Uh, why, exactly, would she suspect us?” Laura asks. She has a feeling she knows what the butler is going to say, but she’s hoping beyond hope that she’s wrong, or maybe just having a really weird post-taco binge nightmare.

“Because,” the butler says, “On the night the locket was stolen each and every one of us was here, on this property, doing something we shouldn’t have been doing.”


	3. Absent In The

If humans worked like balloons, the dinner party guests would have looked like those shriveled, stretched-out rubber pieces with the little shiny ribbon tails still attached that mothers every where find behind assorted furniture two months after a three year-old’s birthday party. 

The blackmail had been one thing. Solitary. Personal. Under control for the most part. But that night had been… well that night had been a disaster. Not only that but each of them had been absolutely sure they were the only ones in the house. Somehow they had each arrived on the same night through different means and with different intentions and never crossed paths with a single other person. 

And in this moment a fear was ignited in each of them. Their names, their stories, their crimes; all they had brought with them into this fight became a tether to their true lives and true identities. A room of strangers could judge all they wanted never to be seen again, but a room of neighbors was quite remarkably different. Had they been seen that night so long ago? Would their identities come to light? Who amongst them was trustworthy?

Lady Black feels herself go especially cold. After all, she’d revealed her crime to the room thinking they’d never see her again. 

Oh how wrong she’d been.

“So this really does go deeper than some petty capitalist shark,” Madame Silver murmurs. 

“Much deeper,” the butler says.

“The weapons…” Mayor Lavender whispers.

“That’s why they’re so old and weird!” Laura gasps.

“They’re meant to be weapons from world mythology and fiction,” Lady Black says, “Figured that out as soon as I pulled out that bottle of holy water.”

“So maybe they each have a meaning. Madame Morgan was a notorious collector of ancient artifacts…”

“And we just left all of them alone with Vordenburg’s body,” Lady Black says. 

The other’s look at Lady Black with wide, unsettled eyes.

They look at each other.

They look at the door to the study.

Three… two… one.

As if they all come to the same conclusion at the same time, the mob reverse clatters back into the study (this involves a moderate amount of swearing and one person falling on their face). What they see when they’re finally all standing back where they started chills them to the bone. Vordenburg is gone without a trace.

“At least the weapons are still here,” Laura says, picking up the sword.

“You planning on using that or are you just happy to see me,” Lady Black mutters from beside her. Laura drops the sword with another clang, her cheeks flushing a pretty rosy pink.

“Let’s see, the crow dagger isn’t like anything I’ve ever seen but… the staff is definitely Caduceus, the staff of hermes, and the red book is probably the Book of Power, also called  Rauðskinna, and that bow has the phases of the moon inscribed into it, so probably represents Artemis… the scythe has a handle shaped like an hourglass, so death or father time…” Mayor Lavender says, going around to each weapon.

“The sword has an old inscription on it as well… something about a dude name Hastur,” Lady Black says.

“The stone is probably the philosopher’s stone, right? And the thread… that could be Ariadne’s thread from the minotaur myth!” Laura adds.

“Which leaves the water, the spear,  and the whip. The water is probably just standard holy water, and the whip has celtic designs, and Ogmios was sometimes depicted with a whip but that’s… thin at best. The spear I have no idea.”

“What about this little tag? It says that this is a replica of St. George’s spear,” Professor Peach says, picking the spear up to look at the label.

“Never met a cheap ghost before…” Lady Black mutters.

“All this mythologizing is fascinating, dears, but this also means Vordenburg’s corpse is gallivanting around the house with a head wound and homicidal tendencies,” Madame Silver reminds them, eyeing the dagger still in the wall.

“So best case scenario… we find a way out of the house and worst case we get murdered by a vindictive ghost in a dead guy's body who thinks we stole something we’ve never heard of?” the gardener asks. 

“That’s encouraging,” Lady Black says sarcastically.

“We need to search the house. Maybe there’s a back door or a window or… something that’s not affected by the spell,” Laura decides.

“I like where you’re going with this, Miss Green, but I suggest we lock up these weapons and throw away the key before we do anything,” Mayor Lavender says.

“Oh oh is this the part of the movie where the heroes come up with their foolproof plan? I LOVE THAT PART,” the maid gushes. 

“He’s gonna be the first to go,” Mr.Indigo whispers to Professor Peach, who looks slightly scandalized about it.

“I have a key for the closet in the hall,” the butler offers. 

“That’s perfect,” Mayor Lavender says, gathering weapons into her arms, “Now come on, we don’t want to waste any more time than we already have. She could be anywhere by now.”

Everyone starts gathering the weapons nearest them, the water, the sword, the book, the thread, the spear, the staff…

“WAIT.” 

Everyone stops.

The cook is standing in the middle of the room.

“You’re not just…. All accepting this, are you?” she asks, trembling slightly, “This ghost business, and possession, and, and magical weapons? This is ridiculous. We should call the police! Someone must have a working phone. Or the landline! We can all promise not to bring up this ugly business about blackmail and we’ll all be fine!”

Eyes all around dart back and forth from one face to the next. No one looks particularly convinced.

“I’m sorry but I don’t really trust any of you as far as I can throw you,” Mr.Indigo says, “Which is far, by the way, so I have even less trust for you than a normal person. Besides what are the police going to do? The door seems very persistent, and I’m not sure they’ll listen when we say WE can’t open it, if we are having trouble believing that ourselves.”

“It’s the best we’ve got to go on, Per,” the gardener says, “At least until we find a way out of here.”

The cook, with her flour stained cheeks and apron twisted into knots from anxiety, nods helplessly.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

The weapons were piled into the closet like a set of ancient golf clubs, the closet locked, and the key pushed through the mail slot onto the front porch (mail slots open in, not out, you see). After it was done, the group sighed a collective sigh of relief and also fear and maybe a little hunger (after all they hadn’t really eaten). 

“Alright, now we can split up and search the house,” Mayor Lavender says, “If I remember the house correctly, it’s three floors, plus the attic. That’s three groups of three and one group of two.”

“We should draw straws!” Professor Peach suggests.

“Quick and easy, professor. I like the way you think,” the mayor agrees.

The cook digs through her apron and pulls out a handful of long-stemmed matches. The gardener, prepared as always, pulls gardening scissors (the can with a plastic safety cover) out of their back pocket and cut the matches to four different lengths. The mayor takes the matches and mixes them up before holding them out to the assembled company. One by one they each selected a match and then wandered around to find those they would be stuck with for the foreseeable future.

The cook, Madame Silver, and Miss Sage.

Mayor Lavender, the butler, Mr.Indigo.

The gardener, Professor Peach, and the maid.

Miss Green and Lady Black.

“Alright,” Mayor Lavender announces, “Madame Silver, your team will be here on the ground floor, my team will take the second, Profesor Peach’s team on the third, and you two will take the attic.”

Everyone looks at their team members with thinly veiled displeasure. Laura doesn’t miss the way the cook and the gardener avoid being separated until the very last second. Or the way they’d called each other by their real names earlier. She tilts her head as the others disappear up the stairs or down the back hall.

_ I wonder if they’re here for the same crime,  _ she thinks.

“Earth to Miss Green, America’s finest space cadet,” Lady Black says in her ear.

Laura jumps nearly out of her skin, “Jeez, what is your problem?”

“I said your name five times.”

“Well it’s not my real name, so.”

“So, tell me your real name so next time I can actually get your attention,” Lady Black smirks.

“No! For all I know you’ll sell it on the black market,” Laura scoffs.

“I sell books, not people,” Lady black mutters.

“Let’s just… get this over with,” Laura sighs.

Climbing up the stairs to the second story, Laura tries to stay at least three steps behind Lady Black. Unfortunately that puts her, well, right at…. eye level, and Laura knows that she shouldn’t be looking because Lady Black is an international thief or whatever, but she finds herself entranced anyway. Not even necessarily because of… what’s at eye-level but because of, well, everything in totality really.

Lady Black walks like every inch of her knows exactly where it’s going, in tune with every other inch, muscle, tendon, and limb. The most captivating part (and one Laura is proud of herself for noticing) is the way Lady Black’s hips or knees or elbows swing out anyway, much farther than they need to, in order to create a classic swagger. Lady Black could simply…. flow in the direction of intent if she wanted to. Point A to point B with no extra energy expended, nothing wasted on extra movement or carelessness. But instead she swaggers.

Which means she’s doing it on fucking purpose.

Acting. Embodying an aesthetic to the nth degree. And Laura craves to participate. Feels like if she doesn’t play the same game, dance the same dance, that she’ll lose something vital. It’s been happening since she accepted the ride back on the drippy, sagging road. A slow fall into the surreal and fantastical night; the one you never forget for as long as you live.

But she just can’t shake what Lady Black said before. A smuggler. God. Why couldn’t they have had something in common? Emotional purgatory had not been on her “To Visit” list now or ever.

And yet here they are.

“Do you see anything to stand on?”

At the sound of Lady Black’s voice, Laura jumps, blinks and looks around in confusion. Something to stand on.

“The attic is up there,” Lady Black explains in amused exasperation, pointing upwards at a chain dangling from the ceiling at one end of a scare seam in the wood. Oh. 

“Wow if you didn’t know where to look…” Laura squeaks, still recovering from being caught in her thoughts. 

“Yeah… sure…” Lady Black sighs, opening the door to the bedroom closest to them. Laura turns and, seeing a door right next to her, opens it. It’s a broom closet and there’s nothing in it. She shuts it quickly, walks down the hall and opens the next door.

Which is a tiny bathroom with nothing in it.

“Why did she assign the shortest people to get into the attic?” Lady Black grumbles, “We could really use that grumpy ginger or that giant golden retriever in a trenchcoat right now.”

“What about this?” Laura asks, pulling a long pole with a hook on one end and a crank at the other.

“What the hell IS that?” Lady Black asks.

“For the skylight?” Laura says, pointing into the bathroom she’d just stumbled across.

“Huh. So I guess this house ISN’T a 100% original historical site.”

“What?”

“There’s a plaque on the front porch.”

“..okay.”

“Christ, just give me the pole.”

Laura watches as Lady Black, who claims she is taller by about an inch and a half plus a few in her heels, hooks the chain and pulls the stairs down. The small rectangular void that opens in the ceiling makes Laura’s bones ache.

“That’s small,”she whispers to herself. And steep. Like if stairs tried to be a ladder and they were really bad at it.

“People were shorter back then,” Lady Black explains, “and they didn’t waste space on stairs when the only person who was going to be climbing them was the malnourished daughter of the cook or the maid or whatever.”

“Wow that totally does not make this any less creepy.”

“Ladies first,” Lady Black says, stepping onto the ladder.

It takes Laura a second to figure out what just happened.

“OH cause she’s a LADY,” she hisses to herself, and then bounds over to climb up after her companion.

The attic is small and cluttered with a plethora of useless, worthless crap left there at some point in the distant path or recently if hipsters lived there (you can never know). Each step raised a cloud of dust from the dead and in no time they were both sneezing uncontrollably. 

“This is objectively the worst day ever,” Laura groans, pinching her nose to try to stop the impending explosion building in her sinuses.

“And I don’t think any dead body of a full grown man is going to be able hide up here,” Lady Black says, leaning away from the slanted roof that nearly brushes their heads.

“We should go find the others and tell them it’s a dead end,” Laura suggests, turning back towards the stairs. Lady Black doesn’t follow. Instead she starts digging through some old boxes, turning things over in her hands. Eventually she comes up with a book that makes her go very still.

“What is it?” Laura asks from the top of the stairs.

“Nothing. Just a first edition.” Lady Black sets the book back down gently and takes a few steps to the other side of the attic. 

Laura goes to the box and picks up the book.  _ Villette  _ by Charlotte Bronte, and though it must have been at least 200 years old, in surprisingly good condition.

“Have you read it?” she asks.

“Once or twice,” Lady Black responds tersely

“Is it good?”

“Do you always ask this many questions?” Lady Black snaps.

Laura makes a Yikes face and sets the book down. 

Lady Black freezes, her head swiveling side to side, eyes narrow.

“What’s-” 

Lady Black puts her fingers to her lip and beckons Laura over. The tight lipped, narrow-eyed look on her face is strong motivation. Laura moves forward toward her but with every step Lady Black moves farther into the shadows until she’s melted into the dark behind an old armoire. Her fingers brush Laura’s wrist and her grip pulls Laura in. 

“I heard something,” she whispers when Laura is tucked against her chest in the safety of their hiding spot, her arm wrapping around Laura’s waist to keep her from moving too soon, “It didn’t sound like it was coming from downstairs and it definitely wasn’t coming from in here, which can only mean-”

There’s a long low creak and a shaft of light spreads across the floor. Laura’s eyes widen. She leans forward to try to see around the armoire but Lady Black holds her back. Laura can hear the blood rushing through her ears, her hands coming up to grip Lady Black’s waist in fear and her chin resting on Lady Black’s shoulder in a paralysis of curiosity. She hardly notices how close together they’re pressed, or the way Lady Black effectively cradles her to keep her from falling over.

Vordenburg steps into their line of sight. 

Madame Morgan? Morgan-Vordenburg? Madame Vordenburg?

The body is hunched over to avoid hitting it’s head, the cane dragging along behind. The body looks even more zombie like than it did before, with an excessive limp and one arm hanging dislocated to the side. It thumps meanderingly over to the stairs, and promptly falls down them.

It isn’t a graceful fall. A crumple really. Laura hears it hit at least two stairs on the way down. There’s also the hollow clack of the cane and the wet thump when he lands on the floor below. Then there’s total silence.

Before Laura can start laughing, a hand clamps over her mouth. She’d been so focused on Vordenburg’s possessed body she’s completely forgotten that Lady Black is still holding her up. Her surprise at the hand is immediately pushed to the back burner when Lady Black buries her face in Laura’s neck.

For a minute she isn’t sure what’s happening, but then she feels Lady Black’s shoulders shaking and realizes that, yes, she’s laughing. Both of them, snickering quietly in the dark as they hide from a possessed zombie man.

“We have to go tell the others,” Laura whispers.

“Oh, I think they probably know,” Lady Black chokes out. 

Laura feels another wave of laughter bubbling up and bites her lip hard to cover it up. They still don’t know where Madam Morgan went with Vordenburg’s body, or what she was doing with it.

Lady Black gently shoves Laura out from behind the armoire. Laura reaches back for her in surprise. They’ve been touching for so long that it feels strange not to. Laura swallows hard and quickly pulls her hand back. She’d told herself she wasn’t going to fall into the fantasy. Someone was trying to kill them and they were locked in a magical house and no matter how surreal and strange it felt this is not a pocket universe where she can let loose and make bad decisions.

God, had she learned nothing from last time?

Lady Black’s eyes flick to Laura’s hand and then up to her face. For a moment it seems like she might say something, but then she locks her jaw and moves to look at the source of the light.

But all her tumultuous feelings are dwarfed by what they see in the wall in front of them. There’s a hidden door in the sloped wall, probably only four and a half feet tall, through which a lantern shines.

“So that’s how he got out of the study with none of us seeing her,” Laura whispers.

“And what better way for us to get out of here and back to the others without Casper McMurder spotting us?” 

“How did she even get his body to fit in here?” Laura asks, ducking down into the doorway.

“The floor is lowered into the crawl space on the other side. This passage was probably added after the house was built. If they lowered the ceiling on the third floor to accommodate it someone would have noticed. And if they raised the roof they wouldn’t have qualified as a historical site.”

“What is with all this historical shit?” Laura wonders.

“Eh, some people like it because it means tourists stop by and you can make them buy crappy souvenirs…” Lady Black murmurs.

“Uh, so that sounds like she’s luring people to their dooms.”

“Maybe she registered it as a landmark museum? Different taxes might do it.”

Laura turns and looks at Lady Black for a moment, “Why do you know so much about historicallly significant landmark law?”

“I just like old stuff,” Lady Black shrugs, looking up at Laura through her heavy eyelashes, “Is that a crime?”

Laura bites her lip, “No. Of course not. Sorry.”

She sits down on the ledge and slides into the secret passage. It’s difficult in a dress and heels, but it’s manageable. Lady Black comes down after her, carefully lifting her own dress over the cobwebs as well. The passage takes a sharp right following the outer wall of the house only one full step from the attic. They both stare down into the darkness, which is unfortunately not lit by cute little lanterns. 

“Ready?” Laura asks.

Lady Black nods, steps in close and cups Laura’s chin in her hand. It’s all the encouragement Laura needs. She pulls Lady Black the rest of the way in, their lips crashing together as they stumble into the dark.

After all, it isn’t like anyone is going to find them.


	4. The Body In The

After the groups split up, the gardener, the maid, and Professor Peach had wandered up the main stairs to the third floor. By the time Miss Green and Lady Black had made it up and were lowering the stairs to the attic, the trio are already waist deep in what seems to be a second study. The real one. Not the one for showing people when they come over and you want to look more organized than you actually are.

Professor Peach tests the windows, but comes away shaking his head.

“Y’know, if she hadn’t had that covered, I would’ve been a little worried about Madame Morgan. Windows are kinda, like, obvious,” the gardener says.

They walk over to the table and start flipping through the books on the desk. Most of them are in old english, but a few of them are….. About preserving bodies?

“This must be how she kept Vordenburg’s body viable for so long…” they say.

“Aren’t we supposed to like, be looking for that weird dude?” the maid asks.

“We are, Kirsch, we’re just also stopping to look at all this weird  _ stuff _ ,” the gardener says.

“There are tomes from before the printing press was invented!” Professor Peach says excitedly, thumbing through the titles on the shelves, “I wonder how many of these could assist in the revitalization of dead languages.”

“So is that what you’re a professor of? If you even ARE a professor…” the gardener asks, wiggling their eyebrows.

“I actually am, odd as that might sound.”

“It doesn’t,” the maid and the gardener say together.

“And I suppose I teach… a type of language.”

“Please tell me it’s Vulcan,” the gardener begs.

“Oh! Like the guy with the ears on the TV!” the maid says excitedly, “You could be in our cosplay group!”

“No, unfortunately,” the professor chuckles, “I’d rather not talk about it actually. What with all the blackmailing business. We aren’t supposed to talk about ourselves, correct?”

The maid and the gardener look at each other. 

“I stole genetic material from a lab making genetically modified foods and published it for free on the internet,” the gardener said.

“I took drugs in college to make my game better. I know that isn’t like, as cool as Laf’s,” the maid says in embarrassment.

“Buddy, come on, we talked about this. You did it cause all your team mates were doing it and you didn’t want to feel left out in a new city. You stopped because you realized it was wrong and you-” the gardener stops, realizing they’re about to give away information they probably shouldn’t.

The professor was looking at them in confusion, “Performance enhancing drugs? Like back in 2009 when the Silas Sentinels were investigated and half the team was expelled from the school?”

The maid swallowed hard, “I was the one who turned them in.”

The professor stares at him for a long moment, and then puts a hand gently on his shoulder, “That must have taken amazing strength. You absolutely did the right thing.”

The maid relaxes, “Yeah, yeah I did.”

The gardener smiles and holds out their hand, “Name’s Lafontaine, and this is Kirsch. Class of 2013.”

The professor shakes both of their hands and then straightens his bowtie, “My name is J.P. Armitage, and I’m being blackmailed because when I was a student of Silas University I was a hacker by the name of William the Red.”

“No way! You were the one who was behind the crash at the library. You dumped the entire archive into the trash and it took them a whole year to restore all the data!”

“Yes, I was quite the scoundrel… but I’ve turned a new leaf and I no longer do that type of thing. Instead I program websites for starving artists and teach programming in New York,” he explains, “My redemption perhaps lies in teaching others so that they may better protect themselves from cyber attacks in the future.”

It is then they hear the magnificent crash from the hallway.

“Hold on, tiny nerds, I got this,” the maid says. 

He runs into the hallway, the ruffles of his skirt bouncing dramatically. It’s only a moment before he returns.

“You guys have got to see this,” he says.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Down on the second floor, Mayor Lavender, the butler, and Mr.Indigo are walking down the winding halls of the house with no success whatsoever. None of the windows will open even unlocked, and neither will any of the doors leading out to the houses plethora of balconies.

As they turn into the last hall at the back of the house, Mr.Indigo is in the lead, with the Mayor and the butler passing notes behind him.

They’re getting pretty good at it, when he finally turns and sighs heavily.

“So I take it you two already know each other?” he asks.

“What makes you say that?” Mayor Lavender asks. 

“Because you two have been passing that piece of paper back and forth for ten minutes, and honestly I don’t care as long as you aren’t plotting to kill me for some stupid necklace. Are you plotting to kill me?

The Mayor and the butler look at each other, “Uh, no?”

“Tell me what you’re both here for, and then maybe I’ll believe you.”

“That’s not-”

There’s a flash of light, and the butler’s mouth drops open, “You aren’t supposed to have a phone in here!”

“Yeah, well, if you’re smart you always have an extra one for work, right? I left my personal in the car, but not this one. So. You tell me why you’re here and I won’t leak this picture to the press or the police or whoever ends up uncovering this shitty little mess.”

“Oh, you play dirty,” the mayor hisses.

“Look, I don’t care,” the butler sighs, “It’s not like you’re anywhere near my level anyway. You’ve heard of the Butterfly?”

“The thief that stole Medusa’s Raft from the Louvre?”

“Yep, that’s me. And I know who you are, too, Theo Straka. I’ve seen you use some of my tricks at customs before, smuggling all those drugs into the country for Vordenburg. I also snuck a peek at all of his books when Madame Morgan was taking care of her own business. Doesn’t take a genius to figure out who you left your personal phone in your car.”

“Fine, okay, I believe you!” Mr.Indigo says, “And of course I already know you Mayor Callis. Best alumni Silas ever had. We did all go to Silas, correct?”

“Every single one of us,” the butler says.

“Well then, your honesty certainly hasn’t inspired much confidence but it will have to do.”

“You’re not going to ask about me?” the mayor asks.

“He doesn’t want me to tell you why he’s here,” the butler explains.

“How about you tell me anyway?” the mayor suggests with a smirk.

“Please, I’m begging you-”

“It’s not my place to say,” the butler sighs, “And it’s not that interesting, trust me. Heartbreaking maybe, but that’s about it.”

“Heartbreaking. Wow. Now I’m definitely curious.”

The women would have kept teasing him forever, only that on the floor above them there was a resounding crash. 

  
  


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Madame Silver had made it all of three steps in the direction of the first floor hall when the cook bustles by her directly into the kitchen. She sighs and looks back at Miss Sage, who is lingering behind with her eye on the cabinet.

“If you want to avoid looking suspicious, not eyeing the cabinet full of weapons would be a good start,” Madame Silver says.

“Mind your own business,” Miss Sage snaps.

“It is my business whether or not you’re going to try to torture the rest of us for some silly trinket. The Madame is a mad woman. She’s not to be trusted and she certainly isn’t to be given in to.”

“Yeah? Sounds like you know a lot about her. Is that why you were here that night?”

“I was here that night because some friends thought it would be a good game to play on halloween. Not that that’s any of your business.”

“Fine, make it fair, ask me what I was here for.”

“I know what you were here for. I recognized you the second I stepped foot in that lounge. You were captain of the rugby team at Silas, one of the RA’s in the dorms. You were at all the school functions handing out napkins and telling people where the bathrooms were. But you were here because of the rugby. The team always buries something of value in the backyard, thinking somehow the ghost will grant them good luck for the next season. How well do you think that worked out for you?”

“It worked out pretty well. Four championships in four years.”

“And finding out your team mates were paying for the answers to all their midterms? Being forced to keep the secret and eventually getting the blame thrown on you because you were going to tell the school administrators? But that’s not what you’re getting blackmailed for is it?”

“Stop. Talking.”

“As you wish,” Madame Silver smirks. She turns and heads for the kitchen. That was just too easy!

In the kitchen the cook is gently prodding a cake, trying to get the frosting roses to stop dropping.

“It needs to be refrigerated,” she explains, her voice like the high pitched whine of a distressed air conditioner.

“Was this food all for us?” Madame Silver asks, “You prepared a meal fit for royalty!”   


“If only anyone had gotten to eat it,” the cook snaps bitterly, “Now we’re all going to die in this god forsaken mansion from hell and I cooked all of this for nothing!”

“A souffle! Oh, but it’s fallen!” Madame Silver says, stroking the plate affectionately.

“Another mistake in a long line of mistakes,” the cook says dismissively. 

“Oh, lighten up. Everyone makes mistakes.”

“Not like I did,” the cook murmurs.

Madame Silver rolls her eyes and begins pulling things out of the fridge and the cabinets.

“What are you doing?” the cook asks.

“Making a new souffle. I’m not letting a cranky ghost ruin my evening. Now, which of these dishes can be successfully reheated?”

The cook, after several seconds of looking horribly confused, seems to perk up.

“The main course should be salvageable. And I could whip up a quick…. fruit salad. The extra soup is probably still simmering.”

Madame Silver smiles, “That sounds fantastic! We’ll have a party if it’s the last thing we do! Now where’s the wine?”

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

While Madame Silver and the cook rebuild the evening’s fare, Miss Sage wanders down the hall to the conservatory. She’s not sure what she’s supposed to be doing, but the walls of the atrium are all glass, and if the spell makes it so that they can’t open any doors, well, that usually means a window will do.

But as she approaches the glass, she notices something strange. A wall of rose bushes has grown up and over the little glass room, completely blocking the view to the outside world. How was an atrium supposed to work if there was no sunlight coming in? Unless…

Miss Sage quickly steps back towards the door. The spell hadn’t just locked every entrance, it had also covered any perceived structural weaknesses as well. Here in the atrium it was rose bushes, on the rest of the house it could be anything.

Though now she did have a really strong urge to take an axe to one of the walls to see what would happen…

Instead she headed back to the foyer. Maybe the others had found something by now. And where the hell had the other members of her team gotten to?

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Mayor Lavender, the butler, and Mr.Indigo ran into Professor Peach, the gardener, and the maid on the stairs between the 2nd and 3rd floor. They could have taken a prom photo, all of them dressed up in a line like that, but they didn’t because they were terrified out of their minds and also in a hurry.

“The body is just lying there!” the gardener explains.

“We think she must have vacated it!” Professor Peach pipes up. 

“It’s like super messed up,” the maid says, eyes wide like anything vaguely round and far too large to make sense.

They run up the stairs together and form a circle around the crumpled form of Vordenburg underneath the small opening to the attic. He was definitely definitely dead now, one side of his face gently caved in as if he’d hit a very squishy part of his skull on the way down (he had).

“If he’s lying here on the floor, then where’s Madame Morgan?”

“You don’t think she’d jump into somebody else?” Mayor Lavender asks.

“Oh she can definitely jump into somebody else. She lived in my brain for the better part of a week before today,” the butler cringes.

“And you didn’t think that was relevant information before?” the mayor snaps.

“She had the body she asked for! And besides I thought possession was enough of a cultural norm at this point that everyone would sort of get the picture on their own!”

“Well in this case, assuming makes potential brain puppets out of you and me and… everybody else!” Mr.Indigo rants.

“We should find the others, figure out if anybody is missing,” Professor Peach says.

“Lady Black? Miss Green?” Mayor Lavender calls up the stairs, “They must have gone back down already. Alright, nobody separate from the group until we know who she’s inside of, understand?”

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

The passage inside the wall so far has two openings, one into a bedroom on the 3rd floor, and one into a weird room on the 2nd floor full of paintings that probably should have been in a museum somewhere. Apparently the 1st floor had been skipped (though they can faintly hear someone singing through the wall at one point) because the next thing they know they’ve found themselves in a basement that looks like no one’s been in it for decades. 

There are several sets of boxes stacked up against the far wall, and a set up stairs that lead up to another exit. 

“This house isn’t supposed to have a basement,” Lady Black says nervously.

“Well, does it look like it was dug out later.”

“It doesn’t, which is what worries me.”

Laura shrugs and goes over to the boxes, trying to peer through the slates by the light of a small flashlight she pulls out of her bra.

“Really? You’ve had that the entire time?” Lady Black snorts.

“What? It’s a safety precaution!”

“I just thought… I would have noticed when I was, uh, y’know…”

She turns her hands palm up and makes cupping motions.

Laura blushes furiously, “Let’s just… not bring that up ever again, okay?”

“Really? We’re gonna do the whole innocent denial thing? Cause from the way you were grabbing my hips I’m not sure there’s anything innocent about you, cupcake.”

Laura bites her lip and tucks her hands behind her elbows, first to keep herself from snapping at Lady Black again, and two to keep from kissing her again.

“It’s just this place,” Laura says, “It’s not real and we can’t get caught up in it. There’s a killer out there and we’re trapped in this house.”

“I know,” Lady Black says, “I think I spend a lot more time around dangerous people than you do, princess. It’s okay to have a little fun every once in awhile. Usually you’re gonna get fucked either way…”

This time it’s Lady Black that blushes, “I mean, y’know, um, fucked over by the bad guys not-”

“YEP,” Laura says loudly, “I get it!”

They turn away from each other, faces burning, and try to find something to look at that isn’t each other.

“Hey is that a coffin?” Laura asks suddenly, peering into a small nook at the far end of the basement. Out of the shadows peeked a dark, wooden box with a piece of plywood over the top.

“Yeah, a really shitty one,” Lady Black says, stepping up behind Laura to get a closer look.

“I mean, should we open it?” 

“I think we might have to. What if Vordenburg’s body is in there? Ghosts… Vampires… they’re not that different right?” Lady Black asks.

“They’re very different????”

“It was a joke. Just open the damn thing.”

“Me? Why do I have to do it?”

“Finders Keepers, duh.”

“That’s not… fine. I’ll open it.”

Laura steps forward and lifts the thin piece of plywood with the tips of her fingers. The plywood slips off the coffin and clatters to the concrete floor.

“Smooth,” Lady Black says. 

“Plywood is slippery. Anyone with any carpentry experience knows that!”

“Sounds like you had a BAD experience.”

Laura huffs and decides not to comment. Lady Black doesn’t need to know about the time she literally got stuck under the floorboards while trying to unload them from a truck  at one of her dad’s construction sites.

Instead, she leans over to see what’s in the box.

It’s a body.

There’s a body in the box.

Fuck fuck fuck.

Laura feels her feet slipping out from under her, but not before an arm wraps around her stomach and hauls her a safe distance away.

“What? Is it Vordenburg?”

“Nope, it’s her,” Laura whispers, “It’s her body, the original body.”

Lady Black inches closer and looks in the box.

“Well would ya look at that. That is  _ definitely _ the original body. It even looks partially mummified.”

Which was when the body decided to sit up.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Upstairs, the group came down the stairs in a gaggle and froth. Miss Sage was standing in the foyer, rubbing her head and looking annoyed.

“Where are the other?” Mayor Lavender asks.

“They’re in the kitchen like, making a souffle or something?” Miss Sage responds, “ I think these lights are giving me a migraine.”

“Oh no,” the butler says.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~

 

In the kitchen, the cook and Madame Silver are having a lively conversation about Opera.

“This one time I was singing Dove Sono for an ambassador’s ball, and I swear this one woman sitting in the front row looked like I’d forced her to eat a live chicken or something and after I was done she said in the snottiest voice possible, ‘well I could have done that.’” Madame Silver is saying.

“What did you do?” the cook asks, eyes bright with the drama of it all.

“I handed her the microphone and asked her husband to buy me a drink. And he did.”

The cook laughs and takes another gulp of wine, “I can’t ever imagine doing something like that. You must have seen so many places! You said you’ve been singing since... “

“Forever. Since I was a child. And now I’m one of the best sopranos in the world. That’s why I don’t understand people who are afraid of commitment. That’s the only way you’re ever going to get anywhere,” the madame laughs.

“So… if you don’t mind my asking, why are you here?”

Madame Silver sighs and sets her glass down, turning to check the souffle and then back, “I found out last year that I have a small tumor in my brain. If it had stayed small I could have lived with it forever, but it started growing. Even being one of the most famous singers, we don’t make that much money. Opera isn’t what it used to be, and I had to drop out of two shows to go to my appointments. I’ve always lived my life to the fullest, which means I never saved much. So to raise the money I needed, I started selling the secrets of the powerful people who come to see my shows. Elitism has it’s perks.”

“I’m so sorry,” the cook says, reaching out to put a comforting hand on her arm. Madame Silver smiles and pats the cook’s hand affectionately.

“It’s alright. What about you? You don’t seem like the type of person who could possibly have done anything to be blackmailed about.”

“Oh, I can assure you I am,” the cook sighs, “I was running an illegal poker game out of the bed and breakfast my father left me. I mean, he started it almost fifty years ago, and after he died I kept it going. The bed and breakfast doesn’t make ends meet otherwise.”

“That certainly is impressive. How long did you keep it going?”

“Twelve years, give or take, started when I was, oh, fifteen? Father was sick…”

“Well, I think that was incredibly brave,” Madame Silver says.

“What you’re doing is incredibly brave as well,” the cook murmurs, “I don’t think any of us really belongs here, do we?”

Madame Silver shrugs, running her hand up and down the cooks arm 

“Maybe the butler. She’s actually an international thief known as the Butterfly.”

“You don’t say!?” the cook gasps, her hand landing somewhere on the madame’s thigh.

“I do say!” Madame Silver laughs, tipping the cook’s face up towards her own.

“PERRY? PERRY WHERE ARE YOU?”

The others burst through the kitchen and stand squished in the doorway together.

“Welcome to the festivities, everyone!” Madame Silver says, pulling away from the cook to sweep her arm over the food they’d assembled

“We’ve got pork chops, and baked eggplant, and more of the soup, and there’s going to be chocolate souffle in a moment if you’d like to wait!”

“Uh, Per, aren’t you supposed to be checking the windows and stuff?” the gardener asks.

“The kitchen ones won’t open!” She points to the window previously known as the window that ruined her souffle, “See this one isn’t being an asshole anymore!”

The gardener looks like they’re having a stroke, “You’re saying asshole now?”

The cook shrugs, “Why not? We’re all probably going to die anyway! What’s one bad word amongst friends hmm?”

“Look, we don’t have time for this,” the mayor says, “We still need to find Lady Black and Miss Green. Madame Morgan has jumped Vordenburg and she could be inside of anybody by now!”

“Jumped…? YOU MEAN SHE CAN POSSESS OTHER PEOPLE?” the cook screeches. 

“Oh that’s hardly surprising. Get a woman who isn’t bound by the corporeal form, am I right?” Madame Silver laughs, picking up another pork chop.

“Wait, where’s Kirsch?” the gardener asks. 

“Goddamit,” the butler says, graduating finally from “oh no.”

And that’s when there’s a ground shaking explosion and all the lights cut out.


	5. Taken At The

In the basement, they screamed.

In the kitchen, a few people screamed.

Bodies rising from the dead is objectively scarier than the lights going out in a BANG. Though one could argue that as there are only two people in the basement and both are prone to being over dramatic and that the sample size is therefore skewed and consequently any general statement in terms of scaryness v. disaster type is invalidated. 

And one, of course, could be told to go fuck oneself, also.

We’ll start with The Original Body and it’s wayward companions.

When Madame Morgan’s body sits up in it’s coffin, the first thing it does is crack it’s neck. Then it looks into Laura’s soul with it’s cloudy, dead, eyes and SHRIEKS.

Laura and Lady Black scream back, turn on their heels, and bolt towards the staircase. The corpse in the corner tries to wiggle out of it’s box, but only succeeds in tipping over. For whatever reason, Madame Morgan doesn’t seem to have as much control over the body as she had with Vordenburg, maybe because it’s decaying, but Vordenburg had been actively bleeding out so really any guess is fair game.

Luckily for them, the secret passage door opened into the back of the pantry, which was open thanks to the small dinner party in progress, and Laura and Lady Black were able to scramble out of it without running face first into the pantry door. They did, however, run directly into Perry, and the screaming and shouts of “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON” start all over again.

Lady Black slams the secret passage door shut, then slams the pantry door shut, each SLAM punctuated by a group scream.

Then Laura flicks her flashlight on and everyone screams again.

“Jeez are we going to scream at everything that happens?” Lady Black asks.

“Where the hell did you two come from?” Miss Sage asks.

“Weird secret tunnel that leads to a weird secret basement that opens into the pantry,” Laura explains, “And you’ll never guess what we found down there. It’s her  _ original body!” _

“Seriously?” the gardener asks, “that’s gotta be like five hundred years old! She must be using those preservation techniques to preserve her OWN body as well.”

“We were on our way back to tell you we saw Vordenburg in the attic. She was using the passages in the walls to get around. Pretty sure she jumped into the body in the basement if the way it sat up and looked at us is any indication,” Lady Black says.

“Oh yeah we found Vordenburg, and Madame Morgan has vacated that premises for sure,” Mayor Lavender explains, “We’d just noticed Kirsch was missing when the lights went out. Looks like they’re out in the entire house, too.”

“I’m sorry, you’d just noticed  _ the six foot five golden retriever in a french maid’s dress  _ was missing? How do you not notice that, I don’t know, immediately?” Laura asks in disbelief.

“Perry and Madame Silver were making souffle and we were all very confused,” the gardener says quietly. The others all nod in unison.

“Well, I have a feeling I don’t care. Are we going to find the puppy or have we resigned ourselves to rotting here?” Lady Black asks, sidling up to Laura in a not entirely un-feline way. Her hand brushes Laura’s back, and when Laura turns to look at her, Lady Black is eyeing her with a strange look on her face. It’s almost like she’s looking Laura up and down, but with concern instead of, well, the usual...

Laura turns back to the group (though she also leans back until her shoulder brushes against Carmilla’s arm), “Is there someplace he could go to shut the power off?”

“There’s a fuse box in the service hall next to the atrium,” the gardener says.

“And Bingo was his Name-o,” Mayor Lavender murmurs.

 

~~~~~~~~~

 

Kirsch, formerly the maid, is passed out beneath the fuse box, which has been speared to death with St.George’s spear. 

“Shit,” Lady Black says. 

“How did he even get that?” the butler asks, “He couldn’t have pried the door open that fast and we would have heard him if he tried. The molding in this house is original oak! The splintering would have been loud!

“I think that might have been me,” Miss Sage admits, “This headache does not feel normal. It’s like someone shoved on orange in my skull.”

“You were alone in the foyer when we found you,” Mayor Lavender realizes, “She must have reversed the spell just long enough for the door to open and get the key from the porch.”

“And then when we found you in the hallway, she jumped into Kirsch because he was behind us,” the gardener says.

“The shaft… it was metal cover in a wood sheath. He must have electrocuted himself,” J.P, formerly known as Professor Peach, declares.

Laura kneels down next to him and slaps his face gently, “Kirsch? Can you hear me?”

He groans, eyes fluttering, “Miss Green? Where’s Lafontaine? It’s almost time for the dance party… Elvis said to bring nachos…”

“Hey Kirsch, don’t worry,” Lafontaine, formerly known as the gardener, says, “We’re gonna make it to the party. I packed a blow torch so we can get nachos on the way.”

“Oh. That’s good,” Kirsch mumbles.

“Yeah, so he’s straight up in dreamland,” Lafontaine says.

“Well, she probably won’t enter his body again if he’s incapacitated right?” Lady Black asks.

“Uh, last time she went into a DEAD body, I don’t think that’s gonna slow her down.”

“Then we can’t leave him here, can we?” Laura sighs.

“Where are we going?” Mr.Indigo asks, folding his arms irritably.

“To check on the other weapons, obviously” Mayor Lavender says.

“Right, because that’s obvious.”

Laura rolls her eyes, and turns to look at the others over her shoulders, “I am very small. I cannot move him on my own. Someone get down here and help me so that we can go check on the rest of the weapons. Who knows how long she had before she accidentally electrocuted this body.”

With the help of Mr.Indigo, Miss Sage, and the Butler, they carry Kirsch into the foyer and lay him down in the middle of the floor. While Perry, formerly known as the cook, and Lafontaine tend to Kirsch, the others check on the weapons. 

All of them are there except for the book. 

“Dammit, what could she have done with it?” Mayor Lavender grumbles.

“Well the corpse in the basement definitely didn’t have it,” Lady Black says, “Or else we’d be french toast by now.”

“French toast?” Laura asks, squinting at her.

“Yeah, y’know, cause it’s a french ghost?”

Everyone groans collectively.

“How do you know Madame Morgan was french?” Laura asks.

“The inscription on the coffin was in french.”

“Really? What’d it say?”

“No idea. Don’t have my glasses or  _ any lights right now.” _

“Look, I love the gallows humor as much as the next politician, but we need to figure out what to do. There’s no way out of this house, and we still don’t have any idea how this ghost is possessing us or if we can stop it from happening again,” Mayor Lavender says.

“Well I doubt she’s going to stay in that body in the basement for long. Probably just wanted to scare us off. What? It was decrepit!” Lady Black says. 

“Look! Can’t we just…” Miss Sage sighs heavily, “Whoever has the locket just give it back? No questions asked, no blame or pointing fingers, just, we’ll all close our eyes and you can set it down on the coffee table and no one will know.”

Everyone looks at each other for a moment.

“Well I certainly don’t have it,” Perry shrills. Everyone else joins in, claiming their innocence until it sounds like a whole stampede of scapegoats is loose in the foyer.

“Fine, okay, that won’t work,” Miss Sage snaps, “Maybe none of us has it and the ghost is just bad at this.”

“The ghost said we were all here right? What if we each say why we were here and go from there? I, for one, didn’t get any closer than the backyard and neither did Kirsch, who can vouch for me when he stops being in a weird ghost coma.”

“Wait, you know Kirsch, too?” Miss Sage asks.

“We were on the soccer team together.”

“I’m sorry,” the butler sighs, “but how is this helping?”

“Haven’t you guys figured it out yet?” Lafontaine pipes up. Everyone turns to look at them.

“Figured out what?” Theo, Formerly known as Mr.Indigo, asks.

“Everything we need to exorcise the ghost is right here. She gave us all the tools we need. If her original body is in the basement, then that’s what’s tethering her to the house. All we have to do is burn it!” They explain.

“But what if she’s in one of us? Can’t she use that as an anchor?” Laura asks.

“She can’t spend a very long time outside of a body,” Betty, formerly known as the butler pipes up, “I learned that the hard way. She lived in my brain for like two weeks while we kept Vordenburg on ice. I guess she can animate the dead but she can’t keep the body from decomposing except with her weird preservation spell, which doesn’t last very long either.”

Lafontaine scrunches up their face in thought, “I think I know what to do. We each drink a little holy water at the same time, and that will keep her from entering our bodies. Then she’ll be forced to go back to her original body and we can burn her while she’s in it. Only thing is, our stomach acid is going to break down the properties of holy water pretty quick. It might be best if we just… gargle it?”

“Oh my god,” Mr.Indigo says.

Lafontaine shrugs and gets up from their spot besides Kirsch to start sorting out the weapons, “Until then we can take weapons to protect ourselves while we get everything set up, we’re going to need a REALLY hot fire, and I have a flamethrower but it runs on electricity so…”

“So we’re screwed!” Danny, formerly known as Miss Sage, groans.

“No, no, I just need to get on the roof. There’s an old back-up generator, and if I can jump start it I’m sure I can get the power back on.”

“Uh, jumpstart it with what?” Laura asks.

“Weird fun fact, when I was twelve I was struck by lightning. Turns out I’m sort of immune to it. I’ll take the scepter up on the roof, use it as a lightning rod to jump start the generator, and we’ll be all set.”

“This is going to end up being the weirdest night of my life, isn’t it?” Lady Black says.

“Look, the plan sounds solid to me, and I think if Lafontaine wants to try it, we should let them,” Mayor Lavender says, “We can split back into groups to protect the generator and the roof to make sure it all goes smoothly, and with the weapons it’s much less likely that she’ll make an overt play against us.”

They all look at each other one last time.

“Hey guys,” Lafontaine says, “Where’s Perry?”

The spot where Perry had been kneeling by Kirsch is vacant.

“Shit, she’s on the move,” Mel, formerly known as Mayor Lavender says, “Okay, everyone back to your original places. Madame Silver (“Please call me Mattie” Madame Silver interrupts) and Danny, you’ll guard the entrance to the basement. Laura and Lady Black, you’ll guard the stairs to the attic and the entrance to the passage you found. The rest of us will do patrols on the floors we were originally assigned to. Everybody grab a weapon, and then help me move Kirsch into the kitchen.”

In mere moments everyone is armed, Mel, Betty, Mattie, and Theo head towards the kitchen. Lafontaine and J.P. head towards the stairs like one of their friends lives is at stake (because it is.)

The only two left are Laura and Lady Black. 

“Guess this is it, Cupcake,” Lady Black says, “the final showdown.”

“Yeah, I guess it is,” Laura says, hefting the scythe in her hands. Carmilla is holding the sword Laura had gotten in the beginning, and it suits Carmilla more than it ever would Laura’s hand.

The final stand, huh?

Laura drops the scythe to her side and presses her body against Lady Black’s. She traces her fingers along that sharp jawline, threads her fingers into those dark locks, and then kisses Lady Black firmly on the lips, less hurried and more certain than before. 

“One day you’re going to tell me your story, Miss Green,” Lady Black says.

“Laura. My name is Laura.”

Lady Black smiles, kisses her again, “Carmilla.”

_ Carmilla. _

It has a certain ring to it, doesn’t it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright that's it for now! The finale chapter/chapters will be posted sometime next week! HAPPY BIG BANG EVERYONE


	6. Appointment With

The storm raging above the Silas house looked down.

 _I could strike that roof with lightning_ , it thought.

 _Nah_ , it thought after a second.

Maybe _later_.

At the bottom of the narrow ladder leading to the attic, illuminated only by a small flashlight, Lafontaine and J.P. are putting together, well, a contraption. (A term used non-scientifically in this case. If Perry wasn’t possessed right now she’d call it “a mess” and that is, in many ways, more accurate.)

Lafontaine had taken the staff and attached jumper cables to the snakes on either side, and would attach the other ends to the battery that they’d squirreled away in the attic once they got up onto the roof. Then after the battery was charged, they’d use it to power their equipment and come up with a foolproof ghost-destroying thingamabob. As a biochemist, Lafontaine has not even the slightest clue if it will work. As a ghostbusters fan, they know that it’s exactly what Holtzmann would have wanted.

“Remind me again why we need a flamethrower?” J.P. asks, “Couldn’t we just use a match or something?”

“Remember those books we found in the study? I’ve been reading some of them,” Lafontaine says, pulling at least three volumes out of their back pocket.

J.P. tilts his head to the side. How in the…

Lafontaine opens the largest volume to a page overflowing with notes, “From what Laura and Carmilla said, it sounds like the body in the basement is being preserved by magic, which means… Madame Morgan probably isn’t a ghost, more like, undead probably. According to this, we have to completely reduce her body to ash or she’ll just wait around and regenerate. Actually why isn’t she regenerating NOW?”

“That seems like a question we should have been asking this whole time. Why now? It’s been five years since any of us even set foot at Silas, and seven years since I personally visited this house,” J.P. says.

“Yeah, it kinda is,” Lafontaine agrees, scrunching up their face, “But we don’t have time to think about that now. We have to save Perry.”

J.P. nods, “The two of you, you’re old friends?”

Lafontaine sighs, “The oldest. I’ve known her since before her dad died and she had to take over those stupid games to keep her B&B open. She’s… she’s such a good person y’know? She doesn’t deserve to be here, and now…"

“We’ll get her back, Lafontaine. I have no doubt of that,” J.P. assures them.

Before they can do anymore circles around the problem, Carmilla and Laura appear at the top of the stairs (or at the very least their flashlight does). In fact, Lafontaine can’t tell where one of them starts and the other one ends. Wait. Are they holding hands?

They’re muttering to each other, something like “I’m not asking that, that’s absurd!” “We’ll you’re the one who wanted to stay downstairs for so long,” “That was YOUR fault,” “SHHHHHH”

Lafontaine points the flashlight at them and they both stagger sideways in surprise. They’re almost shoulder to shoulder, and hidden between them are their twined pinky fingers. Not hand-holding. Of course not. But…

(There isn’t really a but. They’re lying to themselves. It’s definitely the same thing.)

“Hey, how’s it going?” Laura says awkwardly.

“Good. You…?” Lafontaine asks, grimacing slightly.

“Uh. Fine?”

“Are either of you possessed yet?” Carmilla asks.

“No?”

“I don’t believe so…”

“See. I told you,” Carmilla sighs, rolling her eyes.

“Fine, fine, I’m just being careful!”

J.P and Lafontaine look at each other. These two HAVE to know each other right?.

“Anyway,” Carmilla says, balancing the sword over her shoulder, “How are you two planning on getting on the roof? Isn’t everything sealed or whatever?”

“Yeah, that really wasn’t explained very well,” Laura agrees.

They both look into the camera and raise one eyebrow.

(Yes, fine, get on with it)

“So, fun fact, this spell has actually been happening on and off for the past week we’ve been here getting the house fixed up. I didn’t notice at first because, well, we were working for a ghost and I just figured the house was… kinda like Howl’s moving castle or whatever. There is a door in one of the bedrooms that opens to a different room every time you go in there, so when I got locked outside for two hours and Perry couldn’t find a key that opened the door, which if you knew her you know would be basically impossible, I figured something fishy was going on. Then when Betty got back from her errands today it went into full effect,” Lafontaine explains, “But, during those times when everything was locked and we were wandering around with nothing to do, Kirsch and I found a trap door in the roof that still opens. I think the logic of the spell leaves it out because the roof is so steep. If you tried to leave that way you’d just straight up die.”

“Oh, so the only door that works in this whole house leads to certain doom? That’s comforting,” Carmilla mutters.

“What about like, a rope?” Laura asks.

“The rose bush would kill you before you even started,” Lafontaine says.

“The… the rose bush?!”

“It’s sentient,” Lafontaine confirms.

“Well, that makes it official. I hate this place more than any other place I’ve ever been and that is an accomplishment considering the number of countries I haven’t been to I can count on one hand,” Carmilla says.

“Really?” Laura asks, “I didn’t realize--”

From somewhere else in the house they hear a loud thump. Everyone freezes, their breath catching in their throat.

“Ok, I think maybe we need to hurry up,” Laura whispers after a tense moment.

“Yep. On it,” Lafontaine whispers. Together they haul the battery and gear up the narrow ladder, grunting and swearing the whole way.

“Should we…?” Laura starts.

“The ladder is 18 inches wide, Laura.”

When the two gifted nerds have disappeared into the ceiling, and the grunting and swearing and thumping has stopped for a few solitary moments, Laura turns to Carmilla.

“So….. what should we do while we wait?"

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

In the kitchen the plan was about 23% complete. By the flash of lightning (smaller lightning, far away and only laughing at them a little bit), four struggling figures are dragging something large and fluffy across the antique hardwood floors. The cracks of thunder do their best to properly sensor the vibrant exclamations exploding forth from the effort, but honestly it was never in their job description and they feel it would be beneficial if the storm maybe provided some paid training after this was all over. 

“No, don’t just, throw him on the ground!” tsked famous opera singer Matska Bellmonde as she stepped around them. Forehead scraping along the ground, Kirsch groaned. They’d gone back for him after fumbling their way down the hallway for a good ten feet and realizing that with one missing, one mummified, and one unconscious it was probably best to keep as many previously possessed and/or vulnerable bodies in sight as possible

(Third time’s the charm, after all)

“Maybe if you were helping we’d have a little more leverage,” Theo grunts.

“Nonsense. Leverage is on Netflix.”

“You know what I meant!”

“Yes. And I have better things to worry about,” Mattie says, opening the oven.

The others drop Kirsch in disbelief. In the dark it’s hard to tell but Mattie is positive that everyone has their hands on their hips like some washed up 80’s boy band.

“The souffle?” Danny asks incredulously.

“It was very important to that cook, and now she’s possessed. It’s the least I can do. Plus it’s a delicate recipe I learned overseas. You’ll never have a better one and it’s such a shame to let it go to waste!”

She pulls the souffle out of the oven gently. By some miracle the power had cut out just as the timer hit zero. It’s cooked to perfection.

“This is ridiculous. We need to find Perry and help her, not bake her a fancy cake!” Mel snaps.

“Oh really? I think maybe you’re all just a little peckish,” Mattie says, holding out the souffle.

Five stomachs growl awkwardly from the shadows.

“See,” Mattie preens, “Even Kirsch has his priorities straight and he’s unconscious. Now, I’m going to put this somewhere safe. In the meantime, take some soup, or, I don’t know, find yourself a snickers bar. We’ll find Perry when we can concentrate and stop bickering with each other.”

She opens the door to the pantry, forgetting, of course, that the entrance to the basement and the mummified body of the real Madame Morgan is just down the stairs.

Kneeling on the floor, with her arm elbow deep in one of the shelves, is a stoic and faintly pressed Perry. Open in her hand is a red book. Her eyes glimmer with something strange and luminescent, as if she’d been using her own two eyeballs as a light source.

“Well,” she says, “this is awkward."

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

For the second time in one night, Laura removes Carmilla’s hands from under her dress and pulls away. 

“They’ve been up there for a while, haven’t they?” she asks.

Carmilla shrugs and begins to straighten out her own dress, standing from the small couch they’d found at the end of the hall.

“No one came down the stairs, and I doubt they’d take the secret passage. Scientists take forever with their experiments anyway.”

“How would you know that?”

“It’s not the only thing they take forever at,” Carmilla says, winking mischievously.

“Carmilla!”

“What?! You’re a little too ravished to be morally offended, dontcha think?”

Laura blushes and shakes her head.

“We should really keep an eye out for Perry. She could be anywhere.”

“Personally I think we should enjoy ourselves as much as possible,” Carmilla says, wrapping her arms around Laura’s waist, “Trapped in a magic house with a murderous ghost and a bunch of incompetent fools doesn’t exactly beget a positive outcome.”

“So you’re just going to give up? Wait for her to do something worse?” Laura asks, a deep frown creasing her face.

“What, like you have a better plan. A sword and a scythe are going to do much against someone who can literally possess us and do whatever she wants.”

“And yet she hasn’t tried to attack anyone. She had access to all of these weapons and she just took the book of spells. Killed the power when she could have killed a person. She needs to keep us alive for some reason,” Laura ponders, leaning back into Carmilla.

Carmilla tilts her head to look at Laura as if she’s just realizes something vitally important.

Or maybe she left the stove on. Who knows honestly.

“Y’know, you keep surprising me _Miss Green_. What are you, a detective?”

Laura sighs, “A reporter, actually.”

“Oh, even better.”

“Not really.”

Carmilla turns Laura around so she can look at her face. Laura’s mouth is twisted into despair, her eyes half closed and brow furrowed.

“Hey, come on, I was just teasing,” she murmurs, brushing a strand of hair from Laura’s face.

“I got someone killed,” Laura says.

Carmilla’s hand stills. That isn’t what she thought Laura would say. In fact, it’s just about the last thing she thought she’d hear.

“That’s…”

“Why I’m here? Yeah. I was doing a story on the corruption at Silas. When I graduated I thought I could just walk away from it all but… over the years it’s just become worse and worse. When I got this job at…. Well, it’s a big newspaper, anyway, I thought I could finally settle and be happy. Only a journalism student called me up and said that things had gotten worse and she wanted my help taking it down. She knew I’d gone to Silas and that I’d made a career as a reporter and… I guess she looked up to me because she wanted all of that to. So I came back and started investigating… but I kept having to ask her to do things for me. Sneak into offices for records, take pictures. She did it all. She wanted to. She… uh… told me so, one night.”

Carmilla raised an eyebrow, “One night?”

“We were, uh, y’know…”

“You know I know, Laura.”

Laura laughs bitterly and wipes at her eyes, “Yeah, so, she finally got kicked out of school when they found her copying security tapes and… without the protection of visibility on the university campus…”

“Oh.”

Laura sniffs and shakes her head, “I couldn’t help her. I’d gone rogue, too. I hadn’t been assigned the story there was no paper trail and I just… She was so mad at me. She left. And I should have made her stay because it was the middle of the night and I knew how dangerous it was but I just let her go and… you can probably guess what happened.”

“Another ritual goat sacrifice?”

Laura nods, “I always knew there was more to that than people let on.”

Carmilla sighs and pulls Laura close, “It wasn’t your fault, Laura. You went up against someone much more powerful than you and you lost. It was to be expected, honestly, and she called you, not the other way around.”

“I know, but, I was the adult in that situation and she was just a kid. I used to BE that kid. If I couldn’t even protect her…”

“Hey, come on, obviously I don’t know you very well but I don’t believe for even a second that you intended for that to happen. Hindsight is 20/20. Grieve however long you need to, but then move on. Keep fighting. What do the kids say these days, avenge her or something?”

Laura snorts against Carmilla’s shoulder and looks up at her, “Wow, how old are you?”

“I help you and this is the thanks I get? Fine!” Carmilla says rolling her eyes. She slips out of Laura’s arms like a slick fish and sashays down the hall.

“A journalism student…” she muses to herself, “What the hell were you doing at this house seven years ago? Isn’t that more the Zetas territory? Journalism students, what, have that halloween spooky story contest?”

“I was, uh, trying to document all the different halloween traditions on campus. I never saw anything though. I was too scared to get any closer than sitting in my car across the road,” Laura explains woefully.

“How were you ever going to report on anything from across the road?”

“I had my camera!”

“Uh huh, sure ya did, cupcake.”

“Well, what were you doing here? Stealing a bookshelf?”

Carmilla laughs and shakes her head, “No, I didn’t become a smuggler until after I graduated. I was here for something much more interesting than that. My roommate and I were driving by and we thought it would be funny to sneak in and try on some of the old gowns that they show during those musty old tours they give of the house. We spent hours in the master suite doing nothing but that.”

“Your roommate?” Laura asks.

“Mattie Belmonde.”

“You were roommates???

Carmilla shrugs, “She’s a singer now, but we keep in touch. Most of us were here in pairs, after all. I remember I saw those two redheads out the window in the garden, collecting some flower or… I don’t know. Biology was by far my worst subject. Anatomy. That was more my speed.”

“Wait…. Out the window? While I was watching I saw a bunch of lights come on inside the house. I thought it was just whoever lived here. The caretaker or whoever, y’know.”

“There was no one inside while we were here as far as I know,” Carmilla says skeptically.

“But that means that I did get pictures! They just weren’t clear enough because I was across the street and I didn’t know what to look for! Hold on.”

Laura whips her work phone out of her back pocket and starts typing furiously.

“What are you doing?” Carmilla asks, peering over her shoulder.

“I still have those pictures on my hard drive. If I can get them maybe we can figure out who took that locket.”

An explosive crack louder than a chainsaw fight at three in the morning answered her, an instantaneous light filling the windows until Laura had flashbacks to the X-Files and Carmilla’s headlights on the road.

Then silence. Horrible ringing silence, like the world just after someone you love has died.

“What the hell was that?” Carmilla whispers in the dark, her hands fumbling for Laura in the dark.

Laura sinks into her, eyes turned upward, “I think it was lightning.”

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

The man who had originally designed the Silas mansion had always been a little bit eccentric. He lived for hidden rooms and tunnels, doors that open into nothing, and balconies that made people feel like they were about to fall off. All of this, even the balconies, was dwarfed, however, by his insatiable desire for one thing.

Pissing off building inspectors.

Which is why every door and window in the entire place was about ¾ of an inch to the left of where they should be, and why the trapdoor to the roof was awkwardly situated at a 45 degree angle on the steepest part of the ceiling.

“Pardon, am I to understand that you’re going to climb through… that?” J.P asks.

“Yeah, uh, it should be fine. Probably,” Lafontaine replies, securing the battery in an old flowering trunk.

“I’m not entirely positive we can support a ladder in this tiny, uncomfortable space,” J.P. frets.

“Um,” Lafontaine says, looking over their shoulder.

“Oh.”

“Yeah…”

J.P. straightens his coat and cracks his fingers, “Well, the sooner the better, correct?”

“I knew I was going to like you.”

Lafontaine picks up a broom and pushes at the trapdoor with the handle. As soon as it’s open an inch the wind blasts it open and a torrent of rain water explodes through the opening.

“Well, this ought to be interesting,” J.P. says, wiping water out of his eyes as Lafontaine drips in a distressed cat sort of way all over the floorboards.

“I just don’t understand why creepy things can’t happen in the summer,” they say, “When it’s warm out and everyone has lemonade.”

With the hatch in the ceiling open, J.P. gets onto his hands and knees so that Lafontaine can stand on his back. They fidget momentarily, trying to figure the best approach, and settle for leaping very gently.

“Oh god.”

“Ill-advised! Ill-advised!”

Lafontaine sways like a an uneven chandelier for a comically long moment before grasping the edge of the hatch and scrabbling through. On second thought, maybe they should have remembered a raincoat or something before trying to usurp a storm in galoshes and a tie. The rain is so dense they might as well just take a shower while they’re at it. And, y’know, on second thought, screw the raincoat. What they need is a bathing suit.

 _This is how jack felt with that stupid beanstalk,_ they think, _god my cost-benefit analysis skills are fucked. Just harness the lightning, I said, what could go wrong, I said_

Then they look to the left.

“Aha. That’s. Well.”

Lafontaine’s lift-off propels J.P. to the floor. Through the boards he can hear talking. Something about… murder?

“Hey, J.P! Pass me the staff!”

J.P. leaps up, still looking curiously at the floor, and holds the staff up to the open hatch. Another bucketful of water cascades over his head.

“You know this is all starting to feel very intentional,” he sputters.

Lafontaine looks at the rose bush holding the bucket, “Yeah, probably shouldn’t have let her watch the Marx brothers with me, to be honest.”

“What?”

“Nevermind! Thanks!” Lafontaine quips, taking the staff and making sure the cables don’t tangle. The shingles beneath their feet ripple and sway like the surface of a very douchey pond. Up on the very top is a flat space where the base of a broken weathervane protrudes a few inches out of the roof. Lafontaine digs their fingers into the rotted parts of the roof and does a very convoluted version of the worm up onto the flat part.

Down below, J.P. has put his ear back to the floor. It’s Laura and Carmilla, and they’re talking about things J.P. has a feeling he isn’t supposed to know.

He listens harder.

_“How were you ever going to report on anything from across the road?”_

_“I had my camera!”_

_“Uh huh, sure ya did, cupcake.”_

_“Well, what were you doing here? Stealing a bookshelf?”_

J.P. wasn’t the type to sit around to listen to people talk. The gossip he generally participated in was the digital kind, but it was quite refreshing, a bit of a thrill, to be sequestered in an attic listening to two strangers in a house of madness.

_“My roommate and I were driving by and we thought it would be funny to sneak in and try on some of the old gowns that they show during those musty old tours they give of the house. We spent hours in the master suite doing nothing but that.”_

_“Your roommate?”_

_“Mattie Belmonde.”_

_“You were roommates???”_

“They were roommates!” J.P. hisses. He hasn’t felt so alive since the disco bash at the roller rink!

Up on the roof, Lafontaine has secured their footing on the roof and turned to face what looks to be the worst of the storm.

“Alright. Here goes nothing,” they mutter.

The rose bush dumps a little bit of water into their shoe.

“Thank you,” Lafontaine says.

 _For Perry,_ they think, raising the staff above their head.

 _OOOOOOOOOOOH SHINY,_ the storm thinks.

And then the world goes white.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

In the kitchen, everyone screams at the exact moment the lightning strikes the house. Imagine, if you would, that you’re attending comic con and the showrunner of your favorite show has just offered you a job on the set and just as you’re processing the shock and awe, all the lights go out, there’s a huge cymbal crash, and suddenly the entire room is bathed in bright light as David Bowie walks across the room toward you.

It would be exactly like that if that experience was horrible in every possible way.

In the confusion, Madame Morgan in Perry’s body disappears into the hidden basement and shuts the secret door behind her. The others are too busy being blinded and traumatized to see what exactly she does so there’s no hope going after her. Hunkered below the kitchen table, Danny scans the area for any incoming threats and then peaks out at the others. Mattie is still standing in the pantry door, holding the souffle, and looking absolutely terrified.

“Uh, are you okay?” Danny asks.

“I believe… I am…” Mattie whispers.

“Okay,” Danny says, taking the souffle out of her hands and setting it on the counter.

“How about the rest of you?” Mel asks.

“I should have just gone to prison,” Betty says.

Kirsch snores loudly.

Silence.

“Uh, Theo?” Betty nudges him with her toe, the only part that she can reach him with seeing as he’s climbed halfway into a cupboard and is shaking.

“I should have… should have never…. Never come here,” he’s whispering to himself.

“Dude, it’s alright we’re all okay. Deep breaths,” Betty tells him.

“You don’t understand! All of you have done something horrible. Something illegal! Thievery, smuggling, espionage! And me! Here! All because of gluten!”

“Hold on,” Danny whispers to the others, “Did he just say gluten?”

Theo bursts out of the cupboard, sponges flying everywhere, “Gluten! Yes! Gluten!”

Everyone leans back, eyes wide.

“I’m the face of the All-Natural Freedom Bar! A nutrition bar that is devoid of any and all things bad for your health, like GMO’s and gluten and artificial additives! My Face! On the box! And so what everyone knows that gluten is only bad for you if you have a sensitivity to it and that GMO’s have won nobel peace prizes for working towards a cure for world hunger, so what!!! It sells well and they give me ridiculous amounts of money!”

“Uh, okay, that… sounds like a good thing?” Mel says, confused.

“It would be. It would be! If not for the best thing that ever happened to me,” Theo says mournfully.

“The what now?” Danny asks.

“I fell in love with a baker,” Theo says, “His name is Daniel. In New York. If anyone found out…”

Mouths dropped open. Mel makes an “oh shit” sound under her breath.

“Monkey Bread is so good,” Kirsch says in his sleep.

“How long?” Mel asks.

“Two years. I was going to propose but… then it would be in the papers and everyone would know,” Theo sniffles.

“So I know this isn’t news to me,” Betty says, “but, dude, that fucking sucks.”

“But if I give up my sponsorship, who’s ever going to hire me as a personal trainer? I’ll be labelled a fraud!”

“Theo. You are not a fraud,” Mel says.

“Honestly, I think that took a lot of guts. And effort. Hiding things is hard. Trust me, we all know how hard it is,” Danny adds.

Theo wipes his eyes as Betty reaches out to pat him on the shoulder, “Just call me, okay, and I’ll raid every single one of those paparazzi offices. They have _so many dick pics they will be ruined forever.”_

That makes him crack a smile, “Thank you. I guess I do need to face the music, don’t I?”

“Trust me, it’s the terrifying at first, but you’ll feel a lot better once you do,” Mattie says, “after all, I am an expert.”

There’s a long silence, and then Mel is standing up and folding her hands into her Mayoral Pose.

“I was involved in a hit and run,” she says, “That’s why I’m here.”

“Holy shit, when??” Danny asks.

“A few years after Silas. I was… working in the mayor’s office, planning my campaign for the next cycle… one night I stayed late at the office and on my way home I got sideswiped by this big truck. I thought it was just going to run me right off the road but it swerved at the last second and I survived. I drove home, swearing the whole way there, and I went to bed thinking I’d phone it in the next morning. But when I woke up, it was on the news. Champ Hardy. Dead. Ran his truck into a tree driving drunk.”

“Oh my god,” Danny hisses, “You’re the mystery driver they never found??”

Mel nods, “The police found the paint from my car on his bumper and thought there might have been a witness. I kept my head down. I knew if they found out it was me… I mean my career would have been over.”

“It wasn’t your fault!” Danny exclaims.

“Yeah, but Champ Hardy? Silas’s golden boy? Star quarterback? Do you really think they were going to believe me if I said he was the one who hit me? Or do you think they would have protected him even after the toxscreen said he was eight times over the legal limit?”

“One time, I was in a car with Champ, tipsy as hell, and the officer let him go, so I can vouch for that,” Betty says with a traumatized shiver.

“You got into a car with _Champ Hardy_?”

“The other option was to beat the shit out him and get kicked out of school, so, yeah, I let him drive me home once. And then I moved. Twice.”

“Yikes,” everyone says in unison.

It’s at that moment that Kirsch sits straight up and screams, “PINAFORES, Oh hey guys why are we laying in a circle on the floor?”

“Well, McBadWolf, we were _sitting,_ until you screamed PINAFORES for no fucking reason,” Betty snaps.

“Oh yeah, I’m like starving… hey is that a rotisserie chicken?” Kirsch asks, sniffing something covered in foil, “Hell yeah it is!”

The others watch in uncomfortable silence as he picks up the chicken like it’s corn on the cob and starts to eat it (honestly, what the fuck).

“So, what should we do now?” Betty asks, trying desperately to distract herself.

“We need to figure out where Madame Morgan went. Laura and Carmilla said there was a secret tunnel that goes up to the attic right? So my guess is she’s upstairs somewhere,” Danny offers.

“Yeah we’ve spent enough time sitting on the floor sharing blackmail stories,” Mel groans, “We’re so going to die in here.”

“Wait, you’ve been swapping stories?” Kirsch says around half a drumstick he somehow fit in his mouth all at once.

“Yep. You missed it. All the juicy stories,” Betty says wistfully.

“But… Danny you said you were NEVER gonna tell anyone about the weed! And you said it with the face you make that means you’re gonna murder someone with an umbrella, remember? At the halloween party? Wow, you guys must have really convinced her.”

“Uh,” Danny says.

Betty cackles joyfully as Mattie puts her hand to her face to hide an unladylike snort.

“Wait. Danny Lawrence. THE Danny Lawrence… came within five cubic metres of weed BY CHOICE? Is that what you’re telling me?” Theo says in awe.

“Yeah, didn’t your boyfriend tell you? I totally told him this story when I was drunk at your weird gluten free beer thing.”

Everyone looks at Kirsch in surprise.

“You were asleep!” Theo says in surprise.

“So? I met him like, a year ago.”

“But… I didn’t… I introduced him as my FRIEND.”

“Uh, yeah, and then you kissed him when you thought I wasn’t looking, dude. But hey, none of my business right. So I just kept him company like you told me to, since y’know, you knew you could trust me to catch him up to speed on everything going on with like, sports and stuff.”

“.... what?”

“You said I needed to go slow for him, be chill, remember? Well, I guess you said that to him actually, _Kirsch is slow and laidback so stick with him. He’ll get you through this._ ”

“Wait, did you tell Kirsch to keep your boyfriend company at a party because you thought he was _slow and wouldn’t figure it out,”_ Betty says in enthralled excitement.

“Uh.” Theo says.

“I’m confused,” Kirsch says.

“So… weed, was it?” Theo asks turning to Danny.

“If you think I’m just going to--”

“She planted it at the rugby coach’s house and like, what? Both the captains, too, right? Got all of them arrested. Payback’s a BITCH,” Betty laughs maniacally.

“And you knew this entire time?” Theo gasps.

“Dude, I know pretty much everyone’s business, okay. Ya’ll call me and ask me how to commit crimes _all the time._ Sometimes I tell you I’m heisting something just to get ya’ll to _shut up.”_

“Well, as great as this conversation has been, I think we should probably, uh, get going,” Danny says, beat red.

“Don’t sweat it, Xena, they deserved it,” Betty says, standing up, “Now let’s see. House built by the late great Sir Stevens Wadsworth. Secret passage in a pantry…”

She wiggles her fingers and dives into the shelves. From where the others are standing she looks like a very determined raccoon, scrabbling around in a dumpster, and then suddenly the wall in the back swings open.

“GOOD OLD WADSWORTH,” Betty calls out, “Loved his fucking Spaghettios. I swear to god architects are a species in and of themselves.”

“You could open that this entire time?” Mel asks incredulously.

“I’m literally an internationally renowned thief.”

The others follow her into the basement. The coffin that previously held Madame Morgan’s original body is empty, which implies she took it with her.

“Well, that’s spooky,” Mel says, eyeing the coffin.

“You hope it was a miracle…” Mattie whispers.

“But it was probably a demonic possession,” Danny finishes.

“Holy SHIT.”

Everyone turns around to look at Betty, who is holding up a pair of vintage hot pink roller skates.

“Did I ever tell you guys about the time I was accidentally a rollerskating champion?”

From the back stairs comes a loud CRASH. Everyone jumps and scatters.

“What the hell was that?” Mel hisses.

“It sounded like it came from the attic!”

“Wait a minute,” Theo says, “A noise like the house is falling down, a bright white flash, and then a crash in the attic?”

“OH SHIT,” Danny shrieks, “WE FORGOT ABOUT LAF AND J.P.”

The six of them all swear at the same time and make a mad dash for the secret stairs.

“IT’S OKAY,” Kirsch yells up from the back of the pack, “LAF IS IMMUNE TO LIGHTNING!”

“How the fuck does he know all this shit?” Mel hisses to Betty.

Betty laughs all the way up the stairs.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

When Laura peeks over the edge of the stairs into the attic like a concerned meerkat the first thing she sees is J.P. lying face first on the floor under the lowest part of the ceiling as the rain gently pummels him from above. Next to him is a singed and smoking coat rack that seems to have partially exploded.

“Oh my god,” Laura says, scrambling up to see if he’s alive.

Carmilla pops behind her, takes one look at J.P., and grins, “Toasty!”

J.P. groans and turns his head to the side. There’s a giant purple welt on his forehead.

“C’est une affiche. Une affiche entière. C’est educational!” he mumbles to himself.

“FRENCH toasty!” Carmilla cackles.

“Carmilla!” Laura admonishes, before turning back to J.P. “Tuna fish? Laf has tuna fish???”

Carmilla chokes on spit as she tries to hold herself up on the top stair, tears streaming down her face as she laughs.

All of a sudden, Laura hears a manic laugh coming from the roof. She rolls J.P. out of the way and grabs a nearby stool. She climbs on top of it and peaks out of the hatch in the roof.

Immediately a bucket of water is poured in her face.

At least the rose bush looks a little guilty.

But Laura doesn’t have quite as much time to worry about that as she wishes she did, because Lafontaine is standing on the roof, arms outstretched, staff in one hand, and laughing hysterically into the sky.

“I AM THE ALMIGHTY CONQUEROR OF THE SKY,” they shout, “MAKER OF ELECTRICITY AND SAVIOR OF THE DAMNED!”

“Uh, Laf? I think it’s time to come down now!” Laura calls out.

“OH HI LAURA! LOOK! IT WORKED!” Laf shouts back.

“Yes, I see that Laf. Now we can go vanquish Madame Morgan and get Perry back!”

“PERRY!” Laf exclaims, “WE HAVE TO GET PERRY BACK!”

“Uh-huh”

“DON’T WORRY PER, I’M COMING!”

And Lafontaine launches themselves toward the opening in the roof, miscalculating terribly and sailing out over the garden in a fall that would have been to the death if they hadn’t won the heart of the demon rose bush by giving it the Netflix password.

The rose bush is also just a teensie bit worried. Usually people don’t fly, and this person especially had never been entirely coordinated.

Dangling over the garden, Lafontaine grins.

“TA-DA!”

Laura takes a deep breath and looks at the rose bush, “Could you just, drop them in here please?”

The rose bush nods and dumps a final bucket of water over her expensive green dress.

“Um. Thanks.”

Laura gets down off the stool and moves it out of the way just in time for Lafontaine to be dropped on the floor with a wet splop.

“Well, well, well, look what the roses dragged in!”

Lafontaine shoots up and checks on the battery.

 _“HonestlyIkindadidn’tthinkthatthatwouldworkbutthebatteryischargedandthestaffisliketotally electrifiedsoliketwoweaponsforthepriceofonewhichmeanswecanTOTALLYsavePerrynowandMadameMorganisgonnaEATIT_.”

Laura and Carmilla share a look. They’d caught perhaps half of Lafontaine’s little speech, seeing as the suped up ginger chemist was running at about 120 mph on about seventy thousand volts of electricity.

“So immunity?” Carmilla mutters.

“If they start controlling lights with their mind we’ll call somebody,” Laura whispers back.

“ _HeyguyswhathappenedtoJ.PhelookslikehehithisheadonsomethinglikemaybetheceilingordoyouthinkmaybethelighntingcameinandohthatsonfireyepokayheyJ.P.canyousayanythingnoinenglishsaythingsinenglishIdon’tknowwhathe’ssayingguyshelp.”_

On the other side of the room there’s a loud thud, louder cursing, a crash, two _“DUDE WHY”'s,_ and one click of a secret door opening.

The six missing members of the party tumble in through the secret door that Carmilla and Laura had defiled earlier.

“Oh thank god you guys are okay,” Mel says.

“We got a little distracted by uh…” Danny trails off.

“Souffle,” Theo offers.

There’s a chorus of “YES THAT” and then silence as everyone looks at J.P.

“Um,” Betty says.

“l'ecossais s'enfuit!” J.P. mumbles

“Okaaaay…..” Mel says.

“We’ve been trying to wake him up for like five minutes but…” Carmilla shrugs.

“He’s a computer science teacher right?”

Laura shrugs.

“ _Yes_ ,” Lafontaine says, very quickly.

Betty walks over to J.P., bends down, and prods him with a single finger.

“NET NEUTRALITY IS FOR LOSERS,” she yells in his ear.

J.P. screeches and rises like a vampire out of the depths, “I’LL HAVE YOU KNOW NET NEUTRALITY IS A NECESSITY FOR FAIR USE OF ALL DIGITAL- wait what’s happening? This isn’t the oxford teacher’s lounge.”

“Yougothitbylightningalittlebit,” Laf says, notably slower than before.

“No, I was almost hit, I was laying on the floor… listening to Carmilla and Laura through the floor…”

“Whaaaaaaaaaat” Carmilla says.

“I heard the explosion and the flash and I was worried that you were hurt so I jumped up but I forgot the ceiling and….”

“You fell so hard and fast you double knocked yourself out on the floor?” Betty asks.

“Yes! I was so startled when it happened because Carmilla had just said that she and Mattie Belmonde had been roommates!”

Carmilla and Mattie high-five, then hug.

“We thought it best no one knew until we were sure what was going on,” Mattie explains.

“But then we got here and realized most of us knew other people here. Betty and Mel from Student Government. Danny, Kirsch, and Theo from campus sports and rec. Laf and Perry from… childhood. And we all knew who William the Red was, even if we never saw his face, and Laura’s name was in everyone’s email every week on the campus newsletter,” Carmilla explains, “But at that point it was more interesting not to say anything”

“Alright, so everyone is awake finally, we have the battery and the…. Flamethrower…” Mel says, eyeing the contraption Laf is pulling out of the box where the battery is humming loudly ( and then fixing the battery into a backpack, hefting the long silver and black flamethrower like a gun over one shoulder, the staff crackling and popping with electricity in the other), “All we need to do know is find Perry and Madame Morgan!”

In the moldy stillness of the house, there’s a SCRTCH sound, and then the crooning sounds of an old gramophone playing Britney Spears’ _Toxic_ comes floating up the stairs to the attic.

Everyone looks at each other.

“Okay,” Danny says, “Down the stairs, _one at a time and wait at the bottom I swear we’re going to do this right at least once.”_

 

~~~~~~~~~

 

The music is coming from the study.

The guests cluster about outside, decidedly undecided, glancing at each other and each other’s weapons, and wondering who is going to go in first (they’ve made a group decision to go through narrow spaces one at a time now, considering the incidents at the beginning of the evening in which they resembled a gaggle of giraffes playing rugby).

“Remind me why we’re so afraid of the ghost?” Laura asks. She’s still thinking about how they haven’t really been attacked, at least not directly, and wouldn’t a witch with a spell book who wants to kill them, uh, do that?

“I heard she once shaved a kid’s head,” Kirsch whispers.

“One time, the rugby team got attacked by a wolf outside.”

“And there was that year all the faucets turned on at once and instead of water it was blood.”

“Or the year she locked that group of students in the basement and it was two days before anyone found them.”

Laura frowns, “But, like, has she ever actually killed anyone?”

“Well there was a report from the 1600’s. Four men went missing and were never found. They were all prominent members of the political forum at the time,” J.P. says.

“Weren’t the 1600’s when they had all those witch hunts.”

“Ah. Yes. That makes a bit more sense now.”

Laura frowns more deeply, grips the scythe, kisses Carmilla for luck, and throws open the door to the room.

Mattie leans over to Carmilla, “When did that happen?”

“When did it NOT happen,” Carmilla whispers back.

Laura strides into the study. Madame Morgan’s original body is propped in a chair with a cup of tea in it’s hand, while Perry in all her possessed glory sits in the chair opposite.

“Y’know, the whole point of this charade was to have this go quickly,” Madame Morgan says.

“QUICK EVERYONE GARGLE THE HOLY WATER,” Laf shrieks, lifting the flamethrower.

Madame Morgan sighs and sets her tea on the little table next to her. With one tilt of her hand the flame thrower lands across the room. The guests mouths drop open in shock.

“Come in, come in, take a seat. I really had thought this would go so much differently,” Madame Morgan sighs, “All I wanted was my locket back. Is that so much to ask?”

“We don’t have it,” Laura says.

“One of you has to have it. No one else was in the house that night. I checked!”

“Come on, can’t we make some kind of deal? One lump sum?” Theo asks.

“Locket. Or. Bust,” Madame Morgan says primly.

“Why aren’t you attacking us?” Laura asks suddenly, raising the scythe.

“What? And get my hands dirty? I have more patience in my pinky finger than you have had in your entire life. I’ve already spent seven years without the locket, but you think I can’t wait a week or two for all of you to starve to death, or kill each other before that? Trust me, a week is like the blink of an eye for someone like me.”

“Wait… you don’t want us to kill each other either,” Carmilla says, stepping further into the room, “Because if the person who took the locket dies, you’ll NEVER find it. You’ve been trying to intimidate us this entire time because if you hurt us you might get screwed, huh?”

Madame Morgan sighs, “There’s also that, yes. Not that it makes much difference. If a slow and painful death doesn’t scare you into giving it back, I doubt anything else is going to work. That locket is gold plated and the ruby is colored glass. You wouldn’t have sold it to anyone, though I suppose you could have lost it. Peculiar thing to have lost, something that would be so mystical in your eyes. I know what you children say about me. A keepsake from the Silas Mansion? Priceless. But only to Silas students.”

“Wait, so if the locket is fake, what is it?” Laura asks

“And uh, if you’re not going to kill us, could you, like, get out of my friend?” Laf asks, back to their normal frequency.

“The locket is a…key.”

“A key… to what?” Mattie asks, eyes flitting over to the decaying body enjoying it’s earl grey.

It dawns on everyone at once.

“The locket is a key to YOUR BODY?” Mel and Betty shriek together.

“Woah. That’s neat!” Kirsch says, “Totally never saw that coming!”

“That’s the thing you didn’t see coming?” Theo asks in exasperation.

“So if we don’t find that locket we’re ALL screwed,” Laura says, “Body’s not looking so hot anymore. Seven years is a long time not to have a life force, isn’t it?”

Madame Morgan sighs again, “It’s just so tedious to look for your keys. Such a small inconvenient item. In my day we just killed people who took our things. I’ll admit I probably should have searched for it immediately but I had tickets to Book of Mormon and I didn’t want to miss it. Dinner with Queen Elizabeth, Moracco. What can I say, time got away from me!”

The guests look at each other in stunned silence.

“Wait. You’re saying you waited seven years to get back into your own body? Because it was???? Annoying????” Mel asks incredulously.

There’s a pause.

“I’m not totally sure I’m not that lazy,” Betty says.

There are regretful murmurs of agreement throughout the group.

“God, can whoever took the locket just hand it over? Or tell us where it is at least?” Danny groans.

Everyone looks at each other again.

“Well it definitely wasn’t me!” Theo says.

That starts them off again, arguing like an erratic cluster of very angry possums until all of a sudden there’s an obnoxiously loud tinkle and the Kim Possible theme starts playing from someone’s pocket.

Laura pulls her phone out of her bra and checks her messages.

“Do you have pockets in there? Fucking hell, you actually do,” Carmilla says, peeking down the top of Laura’s dress.

“THE PICTURES!” Laura yells, “JAMES SENT ME THE PICTURES!”

“Oh god,” Carmilla says. Behind her Mattie Belmonde starts laughing hysterically.

“I’m sorry, explain what these pictures have to do with my locket,” Madame Morgan says.

“I took pictures of the house that night. I had just gotten this new camera with like really good zoom and I wanted to catch people y’know, trespassing,” Laura explains with a shrug.

“Of course you did,” Mel says, rolling her eyes.

“Well, come on then creampuff, show us the goods,” Carmilla prods, wrapping her arms around Laura’s hips so she can look over her shoulder.

“Um how about I just… pick out the relevant ones… and, um….”

“Oh my god, are those selfies.”

Laura buries her face in her hands, an embarrassed blush running up her face.

“Um, okay, so there wasn’t anything for awhile and then this light came on upstairs,” Laura says, navigating through her phone with one hand over her face, “and then the gate in the garden was opened and closed three times. Then that weird stick thing on the hill behind the house, and last but not least the basement light went on for a little while and off.”

“The light upstairs was Mattie and I, and I know for a fact the first people in the garden were Lafontaine and Perry,” Carmilla says, “We saw them grabbing something that looked poisonous. Didn’t really feel like getting involved”

“The second time was the soccer team, then, and we stole a pumpkin,” Theo says.

“I miss George,” Kirsch says wistfully, “He was such a good pumpkin.”

“The weird stick thing was the senior girls’ offering to the god of graduate school applications,” Betty says, “Me and Mel were in that group.”

“The girls rugby team was also the last ones in the garden. We shot the boys soccer team with nerf guns in the woods when they tried to leave,” Danny says.

“SO THAT WAS YOU!” Theo shouts.

“And I was across the street, which just leaves… J.P.?” Laura asks.

“Oh, I was sitting behind your bumper and hacking into the wi-fi,” J.P says.

“You were WHAT?”

“Yes, if you could just, ah, there I am.”

In the back of one of a dozen selfies, J.P. is clearly visible through the back window of Laura’s bug. He’s on his laptop and looking into the camera like he’s on the office.

“I was hoping you’d figure me for a ghost but it never got published in the paper. Disappointing really,” J.P. muses.

“So wait, who was in the basement then? They must have known about the secret door cause there’s no other way in there. Kirsch bumped into literally every wall on our slight foray into that disaster so we know that for a fact,” Mel says.

“Wait, whose car is this?” Laura asks, flipping through the last few pictures. The back bumper of a lemon yellow hearse is blurred through them.

The teacup in Madame Morgan’s hand bursts into a million pieces.

“Vordenburg.”

She waves her hand and his dead body appears on the floor, lagging through it a little before finally settling into proper reality. Madame Morgan reaches down and starts digging through his pockets, yelling triumphantly when she pulls out a gold chain with an oval locket out of his sock.

“That old bastard was trying to get me to sell this house to him for years. Of course he took it, and on the one night he knew a slew of bratty pre-adults were going to be traipsing around the premises.”

There’s a whisper, like something coming unhinged and also breaking through a glass door with a crowbar simultaneously, and then Perry is falling to the floor like a limp fish and Madam Morgan’s body is making squelching sounds as it stands up and laughs.

The mummified skin puffs up like a buttermilk pastry, flattens out, and pinks. Suddenly, instead of a creepy decaying skeleton, the guests are facing a very very attractive woman who looks like she’s in her mid to late thirties.

“That’s better! Oops, need to clean house apparently,” Madame Morgan says, pulling a spider from between her teeth.

The guests visibly cringe.

“Well, I suppose you’re all free to go. Vordenburg is dead and I don’t need your money. Have a nice… whatever it is you mortals do,” Madame Morgan says, and in a flash she’s gone, replaced by the faint smell of mothballs and antiseptic.

“What’s going on?” Perry asks, sitting up from the floor. Lafontaine rushes to her side and helps her up.

“We did it Per! We’re free!”

“Oh, that’s wonderful! I feel like I need to take something out of the oven, though?”

“That was the souffle! It’s alright, I took it out for you,” Mattie says.

“You’re very kind. I’d like to see it if that’s okay, just to make sure it’s okay?” Perry asks hopefully.

The others to their credit last about ten seconds before bursting out into belly-shaking laughter.

 

~~~~~~~~~

 

The guests leave in a slow trickle, like molasses poured into a decorative lawn fountain. First Theo, citing an early plane to catch, with Danny right on his heels to catch the plane after his plane, followed by J.P. (class to teach on Monday) and Mattie, who has an MRI in the next state over first thing in the morning.

“Send me the details about your surgery so that I can be there, okay?” Carmilla tells her as they hug one final time.

“Of course, darling. Don’t get arrested before then, please,” Mattie replies with a grin.

“And if it would be alright… I’d like to send you something as well, for talking to me and keeping me company while we were trapped in this dreadful house,” Perry says.

“I would love that,” Mattie says, giving her a hug as well.

The others stayed late to help clean up. They had a feeling the ghost, who was now blasting the Hamilton soundtrack, wasn’t going to be pleased if they didn’t. And then Betty rollerskates off into the night (considering she’d gotten to the house a la mind control in the first place) and Lafontaine and Perry got in their minivan with Kirsch in the back with his head out the window, and there are only two left, standing on the front porch and watching the sun come up over the trees.

“Well, I never thought tonight would be as exciting as that,” Laura says.

“Yep. That was one wild ride tater tot,” Carmilla laughs.

“Really? You aren’t going to go with another pastry?”

“Well, it’s almost time for breakfast, okay? Give me a break!”

Laura laughs and shakes her head.

“Alright, well, what do ya say?” Carmilla asks, “Need a lift?”

Laura looks up at the crumbling house, out over the garden, and then across the street at the place where she’d parked seven years ago on her very first stakeout.

She reaches for Carmilla’s hand, then turns to face her, then kisses her gently.

“Yeah, I guess I do need a lift.”

Carmilla smiles and leads her down the steps to the car.

“Where to?” she asks as they’re heading away from the mansion, back towards the city.

Laura shrugs, “Know any good breakfast spots?”

Carmilla nods slowly, “I might know just the place.”


End file.
